Tomorrow
by EiriFllyn
Summary: Death was not the end. Suddenly waking up in someone else's body, the Demon Emperor finds himself without Geass in a dangerous world where everyone knows war. Intelligent antagonists and side characters. Features the Art of War and the 36 Stratagems. More rational, slight AU for the setting. Next Update [Delayed] (3 wks/update).
1. 1 - Cover the sky to cross the ocean

**Chapter 1 – Cover the sky to cross the ocean**

"Yes ...I destroy… the world…and create it…anew."

And in that moment the world stood still. A friend found the resolve to live a cursed life. A sister mourned the price paid for her simple wish. A woman in love regretted being unable to see the truth sooner. And a witch prayed for her warlock's salvation.

Unseen by anyone, the symbol of Geass lit up and burned itself into Code on bloody wound of the dying emperor before disappearing. Far away in the space where C's World existed, in the ruins of the Sword of Akasha, a voice echoed continuously.

" _ **DON'T STOP THE MARCH OF TIME!**_ _"_

" _What I want…is_ _ **TOMORROW!**_ _"_

The spherical form of God rippled and turned hazy. A lone figure whose neck bore the symbol of Geass stood on an unbroken platform, gazing up at the human collective unconsciousness.

"The power of Geass is too great for humans to possess. But, perhaps humans can use it better than those fools chasing immortality." The semi-translucent figure murmured to itself. "Is this what you saw in them when you sealed the first Code, Mokushimi Ōtsutsuki?"

The hazy form of Jupiter, or otherwise known as Mokusei, in the sky began shifting. The gas storms gathered into a single spinning spiral, the surface bleeding into red.

"If she had seen this back then, do you think Kaguya would still have made the same choice?"

The spinning spiral halted to reveal a pattern of three concentric circles with nine magatama. An eagle cry reverberated across the ruins, and the pattern broke to reveal the symbol of Geass as red shifted to purple.

O O O

His eyes blinked open to a starry night sky obstructed by the forms of massive trees. He got up and felt the heavy round object he was carrying on his back. Looking around, he was alone in a forest with a single wooden shack a few metres away. Then he remembered the current situation, in which he had stolen the forbidden scroll of seals and ran away to practice one of its techniques for the purpose of graduating.

'Wait, what? That's not right, I was dying for the Zero Requiem!' The demon emperor thought furiously, trying to remember what had happened to get him here. All of his memories from before his planned death made sense. But there was nothing after that. He started again from his latest memories and tried to trace backwards. He was training in the mass shadow clone jutsu he found in the scroll of seals. He had stolen the scroll from Old Man Hokage's house after Mizuki-sensei told him about the secret way to graduate, because he had failed the Academy exam for the third time.

'Huh? Jutsu? Hokage? Academy?' Lelouch was suddenly at a loss. Information about these concepts flowed into his mind naturally as if he had known about these things for a long time. Only, it was obviously impossible because ninja and Fire Shadows and a _school_ for training ninja kids was clearly not anything that could be in the modern era! Sayoko was a ninja but there was no way anything like an entire village of ninjas could be hidden in a world completely dominated by the modern superpowers that mapped and fought for every inch of land and water on Earth.

As he thought further back, he found what seemed to be the recent memories of a life that he didn't live, of a boy named Naruto Uzumaki. The memories came naturally but couldn't recall anything that happened beyond the last few days, except in relation to people, things, and specific events that reminded him of other events in the past. He could not recall the events that occurred when he was 11, but he knew that he failed the graduation exam three times and one of them happened while he was 11. It was as if all the memories were there, but they weren't properly stored as episodic memories in his brain.

But that was enough to let him grasp the situation. He brought his hands together in the two finger cross seal and channeled his chakra in the way he remembered training in.

A boy in an orange jumpsuit covered in dust while bearing a huge scroll on his back poofed into existence in front of him, staring back curiously.

'Unless I've gone insane…somehow I've transmigrated into a different world as this boy. A world where magic is real and ninjas call it jutsu, powered by chakra.'

But either way, he had to assume it was real and try to figure out what really happened later on, because he had just been fooled into stealing a priceless artifact of the village and no doubt there were already countless ninja after him. And he knew he had been fooled because…the scroll had real forbidden techniques in it, one which he had just learned.

He sat down and quickly unfurled the scroll again as the clone in front did the same.

"This scroll is empty," The clone stated before rolling it back up. Lelouch didn't respond and instead focused on the real scroll in front of him.

The clone grabbed a kunai from his pouch and threw it at a random tree. It collided with a thud before bursting into smoke, leaving a deep indent in the tree. Then he made the cross seal and three more clones appeared. One clone transformed into a sword which a second clone grabbed and smashed into the third clone. Both the sword and the third clone dispelled with a poof, and the original Lelouch flinched at the shock of being sliced apart. He was stunned for only a moment before he regained his bearings, then he looked at the two clones remaining. One of them dispelled itself, while Lelouch tossed a kunai over to the last clone. The last clone threw the kunai at the same tree he threw the cloned kunai, and it embedded deeply. The clone walked over, pulled out the kunai, tossing it back to the original before inspecting the trenches the two kunai made. Thrown with the same force, the one with the real kunai went deeper. Satisfied, he then formed a fist and punched the tree as hard as he could, before he also disappeared in a burst of smoke. Lelouch sat quietly contemplating the results of his tests before returning his attention to the scroll in front of him.

O O O

Only a few minutes later, a man in a chuunin vest dropped down from the trees and stopped in front of Lelouch with a look of exasperation. "I found you!"

"Hehe…you found me, Iruka-sensei. I did it! I learned a skill from this scroll! If I show it to you, you have to _let me graduate,_ right?" Lelouch responded with a goofy grin while he his eyes stared widely at Iruka's own eyes.

Iruka noticed the dirt and grime on the boy and realized he'd been practicing here. "Naruto…where did you get that scroll?"

"Oh this, Mizuki-sensei told me about it, and this place too! He said if I learned a technique in the scroll, I'd definitely graduate!" Lelouch said happily. ' _So my geass didn't work…or I don't have it anymore._ '

Iruka was startled for a moment before he sensed a flurry of weapons and pushed Naruto away.

Shuriken and kunai slammed into the Academy instructor even as he guarded his vitals with his arms and stumbled back. The weapons pinned him to the wall of the wooden shack.

"Nice job finding the moron!" A voice called out.

Iruka looked up to Mizuki perched on a tree and understood what was going on.

"Naruto, give me the scroll!" Mizuki commanded.

"Naruto! Whatever happens, don't give him the scroll!" Iruka yelled back.

"What's going on!" Lelouch looked back and forth between the two.

"That's a dangerous scroll that has forbidden ninjutsu inside it, Mizuki used you to get his hands on it!" Iruka exclaimed.

"Naruto, there's no point in you having it. I'll tell you the truth" Mizuki started with a gleeful expression.

"No! Don't!" Iruka shouted desperately.

"Twelve years ago, you know about the demon fox being sealed right?" At Mizuki's mentioning, Lelouch did recall such a thing, which they had learned about in the Academy. "Since that day, a special rule was created in this village, but this rule was never meant to be told to you."

"What rule? Tell me!" Lelouch demanded.

Mizuki laughed for a good few seconds first before answering. "The rule is that nobody is allowed to talk about the fact that you are the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox!"

"Stop it!" Iruka yelled.

"You are the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox that killed Iruka's parents and destroyed the village! You were sealed up by the Hokage you admired and…"

"Stop!" Iruka yelled again.

"You have been lied to by everyone! Didn't you find it odd how everyone hates you? Iruka is the same! He also hates you!" Mizuki pulled the massive fuma shuriken off his back. "Nobody will ever love you! And that scroll was used to seal you up!" Mizuki started spinning the shuriken in his hand and moved it back in preparation to throw it as he cackled madly.

Then he heard a chuckling sound and saw Naruto's posture and expression suddenly change into one of complete calm.

"Say, what should a demon do when it finally gets the keys to its prison?" Lelouch looked at Mizuki mockingly.

"Huh? What are you talking about?" Mizuki's heart skipped a beat as he comprehended the meaning of the boy's question. He stilled and reassessed the boy standing below, with an uncomfortable feeling gnawing at his head as he glanced towards the huge scroll at the boy's side.

"What's wrong? Why not attack? Your opponent is just an academy student. Or have you finally realized...the only ones who should kill are those who are prepared to be killed!"

Iruka looked at Naruto as if he'd grown a second head.

A chorus of growling sounds come from the surrounding forest.

"What's happening here?!" Mizuki's eyes darted around rapidly, trying to make sense of the situation. He felt as though a stone dropped in his gut when he saw unnaturally large foxes with red eyes and crimson fur walking in slowly from behind the trees. Some foxes were easily the size of several adults and each had varying numbers of tails trailing behind them, with more tails on the bigger ones.

Lelouch saw Mizuki's panicked look, and knew victory was in his hands.

"This demon commands you...die!"

Mizuki was suddenly tackled from above and slammed into the ground, his fuma shuriken dropping on the way. Thunderous roars sounded before he was assaulted from all sides.

As the legion of foxes ripped into Mizuki, Iruka watched in shock, and a hint of fear showed in his wide eyes. Then the foxes started poofing into clones of Naruto as they continued to beat up Mizuki. It was then that Iruka realized that the foxes weren't summoned by the Nine-Tails, but simply disguised clones...that were all solid. It wasn't long before Mizuki lost consciousness and the clones dispelled, leaving the forest with an eerie silence.

"Iruka-sensei...is it true? Am I really the Nine-Tails?" Lelouch asked with his head lowered.

O O O

After receiving Iruka's lecture at Ichiraku Ramen, Lelouch wandered around the village. It was getting close to midnight so the streets were quiet. Still, there were enough people around that Lelouch could clearly see that people in the village did indeed hate the boy whose body he now occupied. No matter where he went not a single person looked at him with warm or even neutral expressions. The village was a large place, large enough to be called a town instead. Fortunately his new body was extremely athletic and he could run around or even jump around roof tops like the other ninjas did to get around the village. In his old body, Lelouch could barely pass his gym classes, despite his dangerous escapades. That was partly why C.C. would often co-pilot knightmare frames with him, as his body simply couldn't keep up with his mind. But where he used to be out of breath after running fifty metres, now he had seemingly endless stamina. After a while he found himself on top of the mountain with the faces of the Hokages.

As he took in the view of the whole village and the great forest that extended around for many miles all around, he felt a sense of vertigo. This place was so familiar. It felt just like home, and it was sickening. It was his home, but this wasn't his life. He was not Naruto Uzumaki, the boy whom he'd replaced and possibly killed by extension. He was Lelouch vi Britannia, the demon emperor that held the world at gun point. He was Zero, the man of miracles that brought peace and freedom to the world. He was Lelouch Lamperouge, the exiled prince that created a gentle world for Nunnally. At the end of his quest, he was meant to die to atone for the vast sins he had committed in the name of defeating greater evils. He _needed_ to die because he killed Euphie's dream, forced Suzaku to fire a FLEIJA that obliterated millions of civilians, enslaved millions more under the thrall of Geass, and embarked on an unprecedented reign of terror. He died for the world's peace and he did it with a smile on his face. He had no regrets, except perhaps not quite living up to his contract with C.C. even if she agreed to the plan in the end.

But now all of that was like dust in the wind. There was nothing left of his world but memories that would fade in time. He didn't join C's World and cannot watch over the people he left behind. He would never get the chance to apologize to Euphie and Shirley and all the troops he abandoned at Tokyo and everybody else who died for him. He was forever separated from his friends and loved ones, alive again in a new world where not only did he have no friends and family but was actually hated by everyone just for existing. Even if he had loved ones in this world, he inherited none of the feelings and emotions from the memories of the body he now occupied.

' _Is this supposed to be divine punishment?'_

He closed his eyes. In one fluid motion, he drew a kunai from his pouch and reversed his grip on it, pointing the tip towards his heart. He wavered there for a moment.

"If you do that, some people will be very sad, Naruto-kun," a gentle voice murmured from beside him.

He opened his eyes and found his arm held by an old and wrinkled hand.

"Hokage-jiji?" Lelouch whispered in surprise as his eyes traced the hand to its owner's face.

The village leader stood beside him looking at him with a sad smile. " _I_ for one, could not bear to see you leave us so soon."

Lelouch's grip on the kunai loosened and it fell to the ground. "I'm…sorry for stealing the scroll," said Lelouch as his eyes turned downcast.

"It's quite alright, my boy. You defeated me fair and square after all," the Hokage chuckled. "And you made very good use of it, I am truly impressed at your mastery of the Shadow Clone technique."

"Uh…thank you," Lelouch responded awkwardly as the Hokage's admittance brought up the memory of how exactly the boy defeated the village leader.

The Hokage sighed heavily and put both his hands on Naruto's shoulders, moving down to meet the boy's eyes level with his own. "I am the one that should be sorry, Naruto-kun. I have failed you…this village has failed you. You are a hero, Naruto-kun. You deserve to live a better life than this. This old man has no excuse for allowing you to suffer alone all these years."

At his words, Lelouch recalled the many memories Naruto had of the Third Hokage. Before Iruka, the old ninja was the only one in the village that seemed to genuinely care about and actively try to spend time with him, eating ramen, sending gifts, visiting the orphanage, or just letting him hang around the Hokage's office. Whenever he had troubles with the villagers, the old man would always help, like the apartment he was able to rent when the orphanage's relatively kind caretaker died and was replaced by someone not so nice.

"No…you've done more than enough for me, Jiji…" Lelouch mumbled with teary eyes.

"I don't have any right to say this…but…please, don't give up just yet. You are not alone, even though it may seem that way some times. Your parents gave their lives to protect you, more so than they did for this village. They loved you and and I'm sure they would have wanted you to live long and happy. In time, you will make many friends and the villagers will see you for who you are. Iruka is only the first of many that will come to understand you. And to me…you are like my grandson." With that, the Hokage took off his hat and put it on Naruto's head.

Tears streaked down Lelouch's face and he sniffed pitifully.

"So please, live on until the day your dream can come true," the Hokage finished.

"Hokage-jiji…" Lelouch's whole body shook as he cried out.

The old man leaned forward and wrapped his arms around the boy in a hug.

O O O

The next two days passed peacefully. Lelouch reviewed the Academy teaching materials out of idle curiosity for the novelty that was chakra, ninjas, and magical techniques. He handed in his ninja registration and cleaned up his apartment. He observed the ninjas moving around the village and looked at the ninja tools commonly sold in shops. He bought a set of the Japanese equivalent version of chess, shogi, and thought it strange that this world had so much culture in common with Japan, yet convenient that he was used to it after having lived there half his life. He tried to recall as many things as he could from his memories so he wouldn't be caught off guard by a memory suddenly hitting him after seeing something related. But in all that time, he kept to himself and let the time pass. Although he seemed to make it past Iruka and the Hokage, he was not truly confident in his acting skills. His great performances as Zero had just been magnifying his original personality, and he had rarely needed to pretend to be somebody else.

And so it was time that the graduates received their team assignments.

Lelouch made his way to the Academy classroom early when nobody else had arrived and sat down in a back corner of the room beside a window. He propped up his arm on the desk and supported his chin with his hand, looking outside the window mindlessly. It was nostalgic he thought, to be sitting in school again, like the days in Ashford Academy when he had no power to realize his wish for the destruction of Britannia. When he was nothing but a corpse going through the motions of living, up until the day he met C.C. and obtained the cursed eyes that granted the Power of the King.

In his absent-minded state, he barely noticed his classmates filling in. But he couldn't care less, it wasn't like he had any friends among them…he couldn't help but think of the foolish activities Milly used to hold, and wondered if he wouldn't be so resistant if he could go back to that time. He didn't pay attention the odds looks he received from his current classmates, he had already gotten used to the special treatment from the villagers when they saw him. Instead in his mind he wondered what his old friends were doing now. Were any of them in danger of being linked to the dead prince that returned to usurp the throne and conquer the world?

"Hey! What are you doing here, Naruto! Only those who've passed the exam are supposed to be here!" A person yelled up at him. He glanced over and didn't recognize who it was.

With a look of annoyance, Lelouch pointed at his headband in response before continuing to look out the window.

The boy gaped as he was brushed off. He was about to continue when the door was kicked open and two girls loudly fought their way to the seats beside the Rookie of the Year Sasuke Uchiha.

Said Rookie of the Year scrunched up his face in disgust as the two girls couldn't be resolved to just take the two empty seats beside him and instead had to fight over who sat _right next_ to him.

Shortly after, Iruka entered the classroom and took control of the situation and began his lecture on becoming true ninja.

Then a random student raised her hand to ask a question.

"Iruka-sensei, where's Mizuki-sensei today? Shouldn't he be here to see us off too?"

Iruka couldn't help but grimace and glance at Naruto slightly before schooling his features and answering, "Mizuki-sensei…has been scheduled for execution on charges of treason and exposure of vital village secrets." He was originally planning to make a random excuse, but Hokage-sama suddenly changed his mind about quietly imprisoning Mizuki the day before, and ordered that he be executed with the reason made public, that being the Third's law enacted 12 years ago regarding a certain S-rank secret. There was no point in hiding it as the students would quickly find out on their own.

Gasps abounded in the class, and certain observant students did not miss the look Iruka directed to Naruto before his answer. However, Iruka did not spend any more time on the subject and continued. It wasn't long before the team announcements began.

"Next is Team 7. Sakura Haruno…Naruto Uzumaki…Sasuke Uchiha." The girl named Sakura gave a loud cheer when Sasuke's name was called. Lelouch perked up at these names and almost cringed when he recalled how bad the relationship was between him and these two.

After a lunch break Lelouch spent by himself, the teams waited for their jounin senseis to arrive. One by one the jounins came and took their students away.

"Hi, I'm Asuma Sarutobi, instructor for Team 10," said a bearded man with spiked hair wearing the typical jounin vest. From his right waist hung a grey sash with the symbol for Fire.

'Asuma Sarutobi…that's the Hokage's clan,' Lelouch noted to himself.

As Asuma walked out casually with his team and headed towards the Yakiniku bar, he took out a cigar and lit it up. As he turned his head back towards the path and was about to put the cigar in his mouth, a black cat with purple eyes strolled across the street in front of him. It turned its head towards his cigar an turned its nose up as if in disdain before strutting away.

"Huh…maybe we should take another path…" Asuma chuckled nervously.

"Don't be superstitious! Besides, it looks like your smoking chased it away." His sole female student, Ino Yamanaka, admonished.

"Troublesome…Ino…don't forget who's the student here…" Ino's fellow teammate, Shikamaru Nara quietly reminded.

"Hahaha…well she's right, ninjas shouldn't be superstitious," Asuma said lightheartedly and continued.

O O O

After an hour Team 7 was the only one left. The three waited in total silence. Silence was typical of Sasuke, while Sakura looked subdued. She had attempted to ask Sasuke to have lunch together and was completely rejected, even told off for being annoying. Lelouch was leaning on his fist with his eyes closed and his head could be seeing occasionally bobbing up and down. Both Sasuke and Sakura sneaked glances at the blond boy who had acted uncharacteristically quiet the whole day. With their intelligence, they had clearly recognized that he had somehow graduated while failing the exam and thought that something big must have happened. And of course, Sasuke saw the look Iruka gave Naruto earlier and came to his own conclusions.

After a couple more hours of waiting, a man with silver hair and his headband covering his left eye entered the classroom.

"Hello," the man said with a wave. "Hm…" He glanced at the three students, two of which quietly watched him with unreadable expressions. Suddenly Lelouch opened his eyes and observed him as well.

"Well, you're an odd bunch aren't you?"

The team went to the rooftop.

"Well, let's start with introducing yourselves," the jounin declared.

"What do you want to know?" Sakura asked in return.

"How about your likes, dislikes, dreams for the future and things like that," the jounin leaned back against the railings.

There was a moment of silence when nobody knew who should go first. Then Lelouch decided to get it over with it. "My name is Naruto Uzumaki. I like justice and equality. I dislike those who treat others with prejudice and those who abuse their power to oppress the weak. And…" Lelouch almost said that he didn't have any particular dream, but decided not to rock the boat any further, given how seriously the village leader seemed to treat Naruto's dream. "…my dream is to become Hokage."

"Justice, equality, prejudice? Do you even know what those words mean, idiot?" Sakura mocked after being briefly stunned.

Sasuke's eyes narrowed while the jounin merely stared silently. The jounin sensei had reviewed the three's academy records and also met with the Hokage prior, so he was aware of and keen to observe Naruto's attitude change since the events surrounding the boy's graduation.

Lelouch turned his head slowly to face Sakura, and calmly responded. "No, I don't know what justice truly means. If there is evil that justice cannot defeat, is it just to taint our hands with evil to fight it or to remain steadfastly righteous and allow evil to persist? But some things are unquestionably unjust. To discriminate according to the circumstances of one's birth, to tyrannize those who lack the power to fight back…these are the actions of overprivileged parasites."

The jounin quirked an eyebrow. He couldn't help but wonder who exactly were the overprivileged parasites in Naruto's speech. And more importantly, did one night of shock, danger, and revelation really have the potential to transform a boy who couldn't read Kanji properly to an amateur philosopher? "You have an interesting outlook on life, Naruto-kun. If you achieve your dream, maybe you can do something about these injustices. Well, the girl, how about you next?" He turned to Sakura before the girl had a chance to say anything about Naruto's tirade.

"…!" Sakura gave Naruto another look, huffed, and began her own introduction, "My name is Sakura Haruno. The thing I like is…well the person I like is…" she glanced at Sasuke and trailed off. "I dislike…" she shot a look at Naruto before recalling a certain memory from lunch break and thought better of her answer. "…people who bully others for things they can't control."

Lelouch's eye twitched. ' _This girl…says almost the same thing right after mocking me for saying it.'_

"…And my dream…umm…" the introduction ended in a fit of giggles. Sasuke pretended not to hear anything while the only adult dropped a sweat.

"OK, next."

"My name is Sasuke Uchiha. There are lots of things I dislike and I don't really like anything. And I can't really call it a dream, but I have an ambition. The resurrection of my clan and…to kill a certain man," Sasuke uttered darkly.

The veteran ninja sighed. Sakura looked in awe. Lelouch felt a hint of both sympathy and pity, sympathy in that he understood the desire for vengeance , pity that the other boy had nothing left to cherish, unlike he who had Nunnally.

"Great, that's it for the introductions, tomorrow we'll start our duties as shinobi."

"How about yourself, sensei?" Lelouch cut in.

"Yeah, you look kinda suspicious!" Sakura added.

"Oh of course, how could I forget," the man smiled with his lone eye closed. "My name is Kakashi Hatake. I have no desire to tell you my likes or dislikes. Dreams for the future…hm…and I have lots of hobbies."

The eyes of all three genin twitched.

"Well first we are going to do something with just the four of us. Survival training," Kakashi continued nonchalantly.

"Why is our first duty training? We've had enough training at the academy," Sakura asked.

"This isn't normal training…this time I'm your opponent." Then Kakashi began to chuckle to himself and his right hand gripped his face as he trembled.

"What's so funny, sensei?" Sakura asked, disturbed by the creepy chuckling.

"Well it's just that…you'll freak if I tell you. Of the 27 graduates, only 9 will become genin, the rest will be sent back to the Academy! This training is a very difficult exam…with a failure rate of 66%!" Kakashi warned ominously.

Sasuke and Sakura was stunned into silence, which for the former wasn't any different from his usual self.

"Passing after an average of three attempts is not especially onerous. Or does failure imply that one cannot try again? Is that why there were no graduates who failed and returned in our classes at the Academy?" Lelouch questioned.

Kakashi looked surprised for a moment. "Very astute…being sent back to the Academy does not mean you will return to redo your old classes. You would be placed into a separate track for failed graduates, and you would not receive this opportunity to form a proper genin team again."

"Anyway, tomorrow you will need to show your real skills on the training ground. Bring all the shinobi tools you have. Oh and…skip breakfast, you might throw that up." Kakashi pushed off the railing and handed them some papers. "The details are on here. Don't be late."

O O O

Lelouch arrived at the training ground on time and gave a simple greeting to his teammates, who arrived at about the same time. Sakura replied curtly while Sasuke mere grunted. Three hours later Kakashi arrived, and received a yell from Sakura and glares from Lelouch and Sasuke for being late.

He then explained the details of the test. "I've set this alarm for noon. Here are two bells. Your task is to take them from me before time's up. Those who don't have a bell by noon, get no lunch. I will tie you to those stumps and eat in front of you."

The three students' looks grew darker as they realized why Kakashi ordered them to skip breakfast. Fortunately for Lelouch, he had indeed brought sufficient ninja tools and supplies, including food rations given that it was apparently survival training, and he was quite experienced in military logistics. Without food morale would not have held up to allow him to blackmail his troops into believing in a miracle when they were holed up in Narita. He had stored a week's worth of rations in scrolls as the instructions from yesterday did not specify how long the training would last.

"You only have to get one bell. There are only two, so one of you will definitely be tied to the stump. And…the person who doesn't take a bell fails. So at least one of you will be sent back to the academy," Kakashi continued. "If you want you can use shuriken and kunai. You won't succeed unless you come at me with the intent to kill."

"But, you'll be in danger!" Sakura protested.

' _Even a veteran can be killed by a child playing with guns… this confidence…is the difference in power and skill really that large between ninja ranks? Or perhaps lethal weapons are not as lethal to jounin as they would be to civilians?'_ Lelouch wondered to himself.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine. We'll start when I say begin. Ready…BEGIN!"

The four each jumped away and disappeared among the surrounding foliage. Only Kakashi reappeared a moment later and looked around.

' _Nice, they've all hidden themselves well,'_ Kakashi assessed mentally. Seeing as there was no action for the moment, he took out a book from his tool pouch and started reading.

A few minutes later, Naruto walked out of the trees and stood before him.

"Kakashi-sensei. Why are there only two bells? Why does one of us have to fail this test?" Naruto demanded.

"That's just the way I made the rules. You got a problem with that?" Kakashi responded without looking.

"How does forcing back a promising student benefit Konoha? Is this your rule or the village's rule? There are 27 graduates who are the future of this village. What if you forced back a student who was relatively less capable than the two others on the team, but good enough that he or she otherwise would have passed if allocated to a different team?"

"So what? I make the rules and you just have to deal with it. Life as a ninja isn't fair. There will be plenty of missions where it's almost assured that not everyone will make it back alive. After knowing the difficulty of the mission, are you going to complain that you should be allocated to a different one, with higher odds of survival?" Kakashi admonished, still reading his book.

"I see. So that's why you called it survival training despite the task being one of item retrieval. This is to weed out the ones who can't face the tough reality of a ninja career. That's why there is only one chance to succeed or fail…just like a real mission. Very well." Naruto nodded in understanding.

Then he ran forward and openly assaulted Kakashi. Naruto's punches and kicks were easily blocked while the jounin continued to hold his book in one hand and to seemingly pay no attention to the boy attacking him. After a few more exchanges, Naruto was overextended and Kakashi got behind him, with his hands forming the tiger seal.

"Lesson one, taijutsu. Konoha Secret Supreme Hidden Technique: Thousand Years of Death!" Kakashi yelled as he poked Naruto's rear end with his fingers that were supposedly in the tiger seal.

Instead of hearing a painful yelp and seeing the boy get launched forward by the attack as expected, Kakashi saw the boy burst into smoke before revealing a log.

"Not bad. Good use of the basic—" Kakashi was interrupted by a sudden explosion from the log and was forced to get away.

' _Explosive seal plastered underneath the log! He's much better than his grades show,'_ Kakashi noted as he landed with a stumble some distance away.

Meanwhile, Sakura and Sasuke had watched the whole exchange from their hiding positions and were surprised at the dead-last's skill. However, Sasuke saw the opportunity and instantly capitalized on it.

A flurry of shuriken flew at Kakashi the moment he landed, striking his face and sides. Sakura gasped in horror, and then Kakashi also burst into smoke and revealed a log.

' _Damn! That was a false opening so that I would attack and reveal my position!'_ Sasuke cursed in his head.

With the field clear and nobody in the open, Sasuke and Sakura began moving.

O O O

Shortly after, Sasuke stopped in a clearing and Kakashi appeared leaning against a tree reading his book. From far away, Sakura's scream could be heard.

"Genjutsu…lesson number two. Sakura easily fell for it," Kakashi explained for Sasuke.

"I'm not the same as them," Sasuke replied.

"Say that after you get a bell, Sasuke-kun."

Suddenly several large explosions rang out from the distance. Parts of the surrounding forest could be heard collapsing with dull thuds.

Kakashi looked curiously in the direction of the explosions.

Sasuke made the first move by launching shurikens at Kakashi, who promptly dodged. "Such obvious attacks are useless." As soon as Kakashi said that, he noticed a shuriken cut through a rope, and was forced to dodge yet again from knives that shot at him from a trap that was triggered. As he landed, Sasuke was already there to meet him with a heel kick from his left leg. Kakashi blocked by grabbing onto Sasuke's ankle, but Sasuke pivoted against the hold to swing a fist at him, which was blocked by Kakashi's other hand. Then Sasuke twisted and launched another kick with his right leg aimed at Kakashi's face, which he blocked by maneuvering his arms together in a cross. Finally, Sasuke twisted again and made for Kakashi's bells with his sole remaining hand and just barely touched it before Kakashi threw Sasuke away.

There was a bloodcurdling scream whose voice couldn't be identified coming from near by.

After a moment of hesitation, Sasuke formed three hand seals and took a deep breath.

Kakashi's eyes widened, shocked that a genin had the chakra levels for the technique about to be performed. A huge fireball was unleashed from Sasuke's mouth that was at least several metres in radius, completely consuming Kakashi who had been standing five metres away.

Sasuke rapidly glanced around, looking for the jounin's whereabouts that were now obscured by the smoke and flames. Then he felt hands wrap around his legs before he was complete pulled into the ground, with only his head remaining above.

"Earth Style: Inner Decapitation. Lesson number three, ninjutsu. Well with this, you do seem ahead of the others, but we haven't seen the end of Naruto yet," Kakashi said while squatting down to face Sasuke.

Then a figure stumbled out of the forest, and fell to the ground with a pained yelp. Kakashi and Sasuke looked over to see Naruto covered in shuriken and kunai like a pin cushion, bleeding everywhere with a trail of blood leading over from the part of the trees where he stumbled over. Their eyes both widened and saw that it was no genjutsu.

Naruto coughed and looked up to see Kakashi, then Sasuke, then back to Kakashi as his eyes widened in terror. "No way…why aren't you injured? I definitely hit you…" He struggled desperately to crawl away.

Kakashi rushed over without hesitation and grabbed a hold of the injured boy in an effort to take a closer look at the wounds. However, Naruto scrambled wildly and screamed, "No…get away! I won't let you kill me!"

"Naruto calm down! Tell me what happened!" Kakashi ordered while restricting Naruto's movements.

"Oh my god! Sasuke-kun, Naruto!" A shrill shriek reached the ears of the three ninja in the clearing. They looked over to see Sakura not far away with teary eyes and covering her mouth with her hands. Beside her was another Kakashi sporting burn marks all over and frazzled clothes.

Naruto looked back and forth between the two Kakashi, and seemed to understand something. "I knew I got him!" He muttered under his breath.

The Kakashi holding Naruto narrowed his eyes at the other Kakashi. "Sakura, get away from that man! He's a fake!"

"Liar, you…you imposter! You actually killed Sasuke-kun! You won't get away with this!" Sakura yelled with a puffy-eyed glare at the Kakashi holding Naruto.

"I'm not dead!" Sasuke's head yelled back.

"Sakura…I'm going to get Sasuke out of the ground, do your best to find an opportunity!" The injured Kakashi put his hand on Sakura's shoulder and ordered quietly.

"Sakura, don't be fooled! The one beside you is the one that injured me!" Naruto cut in. "His goal is to capture Sasuke!"

Sakura was startled and turned hesitantly towards at the Kakashi beside her. But before she managed to fully turn around, she felt cold steel on her throat and froze.

"I didn't expect you to escape alive, Naruto-kun, or to put up such a fight." The imposter Kakashi said as he edged closer to Sasuke with Sakura hostage. "But playtime's over now. If you don't want this girl to die, I suggest the two of you step away from the Uchiha." His lips curled into a smile as he saw the shocked expressions on Naruto and Kakashi's faces.

Kakashi thought furiously but did as the imposter ordered, backing away slowly with Naruto, keeping his eyes on the imposter the whole time. When the imposter was less than two metres away from Sasuke, suddenly two shadows swept forth from the forest at Kakashi's back on either side of him and rushed towards Sasuke while throwing a massive storm of shuriken at the jounin and his injured student.

The imposter also acted by letting go of Sakura and dashing the final distance to his target in the ground. But Kakashi moved even faster as two shadow clones appeared beside him, each tackling one of the masked ninjas that appeared from the shadows, while the original jumped away with Naruto in tow before the shurikens landed. In mid air, Kakashi launched a flurry of shuriken near Sasuke in strategic positions to force the imposter to dodge.

Before Kakashi landed, the two masked ninja were already defeated by his clones and popped into smoke midway before getting to Sasuke.

However, the imposter Kakashi merely smirked as he dodged the incoming shuriken, as Kakashi was now wide open from another attack from behind!

Two inconspicuous trees transformed into the same two masked ninja that were just defeated and drew short swords before slashing at Kakashi.

Unfortunately for the masked nin, their speeds were far too slow to be worth anything in the face of an elite jounin like Kakashi, as the two previously formed Kakashi clones noticed the ambush and easily flickered over to block the attacks while Kakashi himself continued onwards without a glance.

The expression on the imposter Kakashi finally darkened as he roared, "All forces attack!"

And with his command a force of five more masked ninja emerged from the forest and dashed madly towards the combatants.

Kakashi took one glance backwards before he narrowed his eye and continued on his way to Sasuke. The two Kakashi clones immediately defeated the two masked ninja. Then the two clones disappeared in bursts of speed and the rest of the attacking force was easily wiped out in seconds.

As Sasuke and Sakura watched, they marveled at the power of their sensei.

Just as Kakashi reached Sasuke, he noticed the imposter was once again smiling while Sasuke and Sakura's expressions turned into horror.

Blood spurted out as a kunai pierced through Kakashi's chest and came out the other end.

Kakashi let go of his student with wide eyes, before Naruto withdrew the kunai fiercely and gave a helpful push as the jounin slid to the ground.

Lelouch stood up to his full height, his injuries apparently not as severe as they seemed. Or perhaps they had already healed significantly. He glanced down at the body of Kakashi while the imposter behind him burst into smoke. He walked forward lightly towards the bells at Kakashi's side.

Sasuke and Sakura were completely speechless as they saw the emotionless face of their teammate. Soon enough, Sasuke's eyes seemed to see another image overlapping the murderous person in front of him. The man who had betrayed them all without a hint of hesitation.

Sakura felt her stomach churn as she saw the heavily wounded Kakashi whose face had slackened and eyes were staring blankly into the air. Her face looked increasingly pale, but fortunately she did not have breakfast so there was nothing to puke up.

However, the silence didn't last long as the body of Kakashi burst into smoke and revealed a log. Simultaneously, hands emerged from the ground and grabbed onto Naruto's ankles, pulling him down in the same manner as Sasuke.

Kakashi reappeared from the ground in front the three students with an unreadable expression.

He looked squatted down and locked gazes with Naruto. "Lesson 4: Don't underestimate your opponent's intelligence. It's not that easy to fool a jounin, though injuring yourself to get my trust was impressive. Unfortunately, I wouldn't just leave Sakura unconscious by herself, and your clones were far too weak into be enemy ninja capable of infiltrating this far into Konoha."

Then the sound of an alarm rang out.

O O O

Kakashi ate his lunch in front of the three students. They had returned to the meeting area and each of the students sat by a wooden post.

Despite their hunger, neither Sakura nor Sasuke had any mind to covet the food Kakashi was showing off in front of them. Lelouch just watched with a detached expression as he had plenty of rations. All of them had returned in silence and were waiting for Kakashi's judgement.

Shortly after, Kakashi finished and put the lunch box down.

"There's no need for you to go back to the Academy," Kakashi said neutrally.

Sakura and Sasuke perked up slightly, while a glint entered Lelouch's eyes.

"You should quit being ninja!" Kakashi shouted afterwards, shocking his students.

"Why do you think you were ordered into teams and doing this training?" Kakashi asked darkly.

"H-huh? What do you mean?" Sakura asked after there was no response from the other two.

"The answer that helps you pass this test. As ninjas, you must learn to see underneath the underneath," said Kakashi.

"We were supposed to work as a team to take the bells, right?" Lelouch finally answered.

Kakashi's gaze turned to him and stared hard.

"You set us up to fight amongst ourselves by only having two bells. But if we could put aside our personal interest and work for the sake of completing the mission, perhaps then we would have a small chance against a jounin," Lelouch continued on.

"That's right," Kakashi shifted his gaze back to look at them evenly. "Yet…Sakura, you ignored Naruto and only thought about Sasuke. Sasuke, you assumed the others would get in your way. Naruto…you seemed to understand a little bit, but what you did was the opposite of teamwork. Deceiving everyone, taking your teammates hostage, and attacking me while I was protecting you."

As he said the last part, Kakashi felt a wave of nausea. Naruto's performance was far out of his expectations. It was stunningly efficient and stunningly despicable.

"I will admit Sasuke and Naruto, that the two of you are very talented as individuals. A less experienced jounin might have even fallen to your scheme, Naruto. However, this is a team…and teamwork is even more important than individual skills. Individual actions that disrupt the team can put your comrades in danger and even get you killed. And Naruto, your comrades…are not just pawns for you to use." Kakashi stopped there and got up, preparing to walk over to the memorial stone.

Then he felt another wave of nausea, as if the world was tilting. He stumbled and put a hand to his head.

"You're right, Kakashi-sensei. As ninjas, we must see underneath the underneath." A second Naruto walked up to Kakashi from behind calmly.

Kakashi collapsed as his vision swam and lost feeling in his muscles. Lelouch grabbed him before he hit the ground and relieved him of the bells. "I never thought of them as pawns or intended to let anyone come to harm. It was nothing more than a diversion to confirm the answer to this test. Naturally, we were all just acting. The truth is, you were soundly defeated by our combined efforts, right Sakura, Sasuke?"

He looked at his two gaping teammates and smiled brilliantly.

"Don't worry about being late to report back to the Hokage, sensei, as your new team, we will make sure to highlight your excellent teaching skills and key lessons in our report."

Lelouch gently let down the jounin who started to foam at the mouth and took out a small metal object.

"You shouldn't have eaten lunch, sensei. Unfortunately, you won't get a chance to puke."

The last thing Kakashi heard before blacking out was the sound of a familiar alarm ringing.

"Checkmate."

O O O

AN: _Cover the sky to cross the ocean_ – First of 36 strategems, this is the art of using false goals to deceive your enemy until the real objective is achieved. The essence of this stratagem is taking one course of action that serves two different goals, one your opponent will see, and one they didn't even realize could be a goal. In this chapter, the title stratagem was used at least 6 times. Did you catch them all? Official answers will be revealed in next chapter's AN.


	2. 2 - Toss a brick to get a jade gem

**Chapter 2 – Toss a brick to get a jade gem**

A teenage girl with waist-length green hair wearing a Victoria era dress was walking up stone stairs that seemed to float in the air. Her skin was as smooth as jade and ageless without blemish. A bulky man with a strange metallic orange device covering his left eye followed behind silently, lugging a pure black rectangular box the size of a person behind him.

At the top of the stairs was a flat platform with a raised panel. Exotic symbols covered the surface of the panel which was made of an unknown substance, too technologically advanced to be discerned. Soft lights flickered on the panel with no apparent circuitry or electronic components. Such was the nature of the things within the Thought Elevator, strange and surreal. According to the Geass Cult, they were vestiges of an ancient civilization, built to project the power of human thought into the world, and were tools necessary to build the Sword of Akasha.

The leading girl gently placed her right palm on the panel and closed her golden eyes. A dazzling multicolored light enveloped the two and nothing could be seen. When the light dispersed, what appeared before their eyes was a completely new place, where the glorious face of the Gods shone brightly above.

"My Empress, someone's here!" The voice of Jeremiah Gottwald, the Orange Knight, whispered from behind the mysterious empress that Britannian public never knew.

O O O

The Hokage was looking over the latest batch of genin placements and speculating on the results. He had designed these with certain expectations in mind, but couldn't help but wonder – knowing Kakashi's stubborn ways, would he actually fail this team as well?

But the question he was most interested in was: how would Naruto fare?

Before the Forbidden Scroll incident, he had prepared backup methods to get Naruto to pass with this batch of clan heirs and future powers in Konoha, as he was well aware of Naruto's horrendous grades and difficulty with the regular clone technique from his excessive chakra reserves. After all it would be ridiculous if the village's sole jinchuuriki, and son of some _very_ important people couldn't even become ninja. Not to mention it was illogical to expect him to be able to do the clone technique anyway.

Then Mizuki neatly solved that for him.

However, he had seen everything through his crystal ball that, and was deeply intrigued by Naruto's accomplishments the entire night, from the infiltration of his house to swipe the scroll, to learning the shadow clone, and finally the method of defeating Mizuki.

From his sudden attitude shift and dramatic manner, it was almost like…everything was just a big performance to him.

If Hiruzen hadn't known that there were no such thing as multi-tailed fox summons, even he might've been tricked into thinking for a moment that the fox had taken over!

In the end, it seemed like Naruto was much smarter than he used to act, but was hiding a truly staggering amount of pain. Fortunately Hiruzen was closely monitoring him and stopped the boy from doing anything regretful.

Now there was an interesting new question. Before, if Hiruzen had to step in and use a special method to help him pass, Naruto would have been allotted to the traditional best male, best female, worst student team combination.

But now it was obvious that Naruto was not at all the traditional thick-headed worst student that would become great through extreme hard work.

Was it really fine to stick with the tried and true combination even if it didn't quite match the circumstances?

Then the door to his office opened and he was broken out of his meandering thoughts.

"…Naruto-kun? And Sasuke-kun, Sakura-chan, what are you doing here? Don't tell me Kakashi still hasn't shown up?" The Hokage asked with a surprised look. He looked at the time – half past noon. Late by more than six hours? His face darkened. There were limits to how lenient he could be and maintain discipline in his troops.

"That's not it, Hokage-jiji! We just finished his test and came to report," Naruto said with a light laugh. "He was really late though."

Hiruzen's face twitched. 'So…not late but already pawning off responsibilities to his team. Great.'

"And where is Kakashi? It should be his responsibility to report to me. I'll have to have a talk with him about how to be a proper sensei…" The Hokage asked with a frown.

"Oh it's not his fault, jiji. Except for being late, he had some good lessons for us. But the test was to take these bells from him and he told us to come with intent to kill so we went all out and now he's in the hospital." Naruto explained as he took out the two bells swiped from Kakashi.

The Hokage blinked. Then he rubbed his eyes and squinted.

"What." The Hokage asked dumbly. "You…took the bells from him? And he's in the hospital?"

"That's right! He's unconscious now and never told us what to do afterwards to finish team registration, so we came here by ourselves," Naruto continued.

The Hokage looked at Sasuke and Sakura. The two appeared extremely nervous and their sweat was visibly dripping from their faces. Neither of them were willing to meet his eyes.

"Well then. I suppose it would be alright for me to take your report. Tell me everything. Slowly."

O O O

"So…let me see if I got everything down right. First, you tailed the other genin teams with your shadow clones while Kakashi hadn't arrived, and you observed their tests in preparation for your own." The Hokage asked while looking at his notes.

"Correct," Lelouch said.

"When the test started, you were suspicious about the test rules and questioned Kakashi about it, thereby figuring out that you were supposed to treat it as a real mission."

Lelouch nodded.

"Then when you fought him briefly and realized he could not be defeated through combat. You retreated and pretended to be less stealthy than you really were so he would think he had kept track of your movements."

"I don't know if that actually worked or if he simply never bothered to keep track of us aside from the time Sakura was unconscious," Lelouch added thoughtfully

"Sakura and Sasuke engaged him separately, while you acted out a battle against an imposter Kakashi and even injured yourself to make it more realistic. When Sakura and Sasuke were both defeated, you came on to the scene and created a fake hostage situation. You used the fake enemy ninja to pressure Kakashi into keeping his attention on protecting the three of you, while you looked for an opening to deliver a critical blow." At this the Hokage paused a bit as he seemed to be thinking about something.

"Why did you create a hostage situation? Why not simply have enemy ninja attack? You were already close to him because of your injuries," Hirzen asked piercingly.

Lelouch responded easily. "Three reasons. First, my clones are too weak to make a direct assault credible. The hostage situation would distract him from observing my injuries closely but without immediately giving the whole act away.

"Second, I wanted him to be mentally bogged down by creating a complicated situation, leaving less mental power to consider anything beyond it. Human perception of time also becomes slower when our brains record more details in the memory, so it would reduce his suspicion when the early alarm went off."

"Third, I needed a way to bring the whole team together in one spot but slightly separated. This created multiple separated targets for the enemy ninja, which means he would be pressured to use shadow clones or other advanced jutsu even if my clones' attacks were unimpressive individually. And because all of us were in the same area, combined with how I deliberately let him track me before, this would give Kakashi-sensei the false perception that we were all accounted for. Thus, if he had any secret shadow clones keeping tabs on the alarm bell and lunch boxes, he would be comfortable removing them to conserve chakra. I knew that he could use shadow clones because he used one to take down Sakura while chasing Sasuke and my own clones were also keeping tabs on them."

Sasuke and Sakura stared at Naruto as if he was some sort of alien. Just when they thought he was ten moves ahead…it turned out he was a hundred moves ahead!

Even the Hokage nearly gawked. He had been expecting the first reason, but he had thought there were better ways to do it, without taking a teammate hostage and attacking another one. But then he heard the second and third reasons. 'Is this even in the realm of strategy and tactics anymore? The way Kakashi was completely predicted, it's like he was just another piece on the board to be manipulated rather than an actual opponent.'

"And so…when Kakashi was distracted by all this, you switched the alarm bell and poisoned the lunch boxes. Then Kakashi was tricked into revealing the answer to the test because he thought time was up. Finally, he also ate the poisoned lunch and was defeated."

"Yes."

The old man couldn't help but carefully reassess his view of Naruto. There were those called geniuses like Kakashi, and then there was…this.

"I suppose you also had a plan for if he saw through your poison, then?" Hiruzen had a hungry look to him, as if he was eager to hear what other exciting schemes Naruto had cooked up.

Lelouch smirked. This old man clearly understood his greatness. "Of course. But I'm a real ninja now! I can't just reveal all my tricks the way I used to with my pranks, right?"

Hiruzen laughed heartily. At those words he thought back to the time Naruto had forewarned that he'd be painting the Hokage monuments to prove that he was going to surpass all the previous Hokages. Then he did it and nobody caught him even though the entire village should have been able to see it.

Lelouch couldn't help but chuckle along with Hiruzen's merriment.

Sasuke and Sakura glanced between themselves and back to the two laughing people in the room, unsure of what exactly was so funny. They were still concerned about lying during the report to the Hokage that they'd known the gist of Naruto's plan beforehand and were willingly acting along the whole time. They didn't want to lie…but Kakashi had told them to "quit being ninja" based on their actual performance.

"Yes…you're a real ninja now. Congratulations, Team 7. You pass." The Hokage said definitively once he finished laughing. Then he gave Sasuke and Sakura a knowing look. "You showed excellent teamwork in this… _report_. I'll inform Kakashi when he wakes up." He could easily see what happened here, but the fact that they were willing to lie together was also a form of teamwork, so he let it pass.

After Team 7 was dismissed, and the Hokage was alone again, he took off his hat and put it on the desk. Looking at the hat, he thought to himself, 'It's almost…too good to be true.'

O O O

The new jounin instructors were lined up in front of the Hokage, who was seated behind a desk, and the Jounin Commander, Shikaku Nara who stood beside the Hokage. They were all gathered in the Jounin headquarters. Iruka was also at the meeting sitting to the side as this batch of graduates was taught by him.

"Team 1, fail."

…

"Team 6, fail."

Kakashi wasn't there to report for Team 7, but everybody knew he was going to be late as usual and report last.

"Team 8, pass," said Kurenai Yuhi, a slender woman with red eyes and untamed black hair wearing a red mesh armor with only the right sleeve visible and a white patterned overdress.

Team 9 was still active together from a previous batch so that was also skipped.

"Team 10, pass," Asuma reported with his hands in his pockets.

The Hokage nodded. "The results are as expected."

"Man, when is Kakashi going to get here? Didn't we give him a wrong early time so he'd show up late on time?" asked Genma Shiranui, special jounin whose specialization was in elite bodyguarding.

"Ah yes, Kakashi," The Hokage started with a serious expression. "There is no need to wait for him."

The gathered jounin looked confused. Was the Hokage fed up with Kakashi's lateness?

Then their village leader smirked gleefully. "As a result of his intense testing methods, Kakashi is now recuperating in the hospital."

"Uh? Seriously? I'd say he deserves it for failing 7 teams, but…really? Did his libido burst in the middle of reading Come Come Paradise?" Genma joked.

"That joke doesn't even make sense, Genma," said Gekko Hayate, another special jounin, whose specialization was in kenjutsu and stealth. The two of them both wore bandana style headbands and the traditional jounin vest.

"No…I'm afraid he had no time to be reading during this test," The Hokage said, keeping up the suspense.

The jounin started murmuring among themselves. By now they could guess at what the Hokage was hinting at, but it was too outrageous!

"The Uchiha's good, but he's not _that_ good, right?" An unidentifiable voice whispered.

"Maybe the Uzumaki brat learned something crazy from the Forbidden Scroll?" Another unidentifiable voice whispered.

"For the first time in Konoha history, the bell test was challenged and overcome by claiming the bells by force. Kakashi was completed defeated by Team 7 and the bells taken from his unconscious body," The Hokage declared solemnly.

The room went silent. Iruka's mouth fell open but couldn't say anything.

The Hokage took in the silence with content. "It seems that Konoha's resident prankster has graduated into a deadly tactician. With the cooperation of his new teammates Sakura and Sasuke, Naruto devised a plan to defeat Kakashi using common ninja techniques. Except for the shadow clone Naruto learned a few days ago, only C-rank and lower jutsu were involved."

It was not typical at these meetings to report the process of how each team passed or failed. But in this case Hiruzen made an exception and deliberately emphasized Naruto's role. It was not only because he wanted to plant an early seed for a possible succession candidate, he also had some other reasons to draw attention to Naruto specifically. For one, some jounin no doubt noticed Naruto spying on their tests, but what their reaction would be was still an open question.

"Shit. Isn't Kakashi supposed to be the strongest jounin in Konoha below the Sannin?" Asuma muttered out loud. The Sannin was really just Jiraiya now, but it was also politically incorrect to imply that Tsunade Senju was no longer in Konoha, so he used the title out of habit. He didn't notice his cigar falling out of his mouth. Then he immediately thought of his own test and team. 'Two of the students with the worst grades turn out to be true geniuses…I better do that IQ test for Shikamaru soon.'

"Somebody needs to tell Guy! This is…it's…so _youthful_!" Genma parodied.

"Im-impossible…that dumb delinquent is actually a super genius?" asked Ebisu as he pushed up his sunglasses. This was another special jounin, specializing in elite training, and also the personal tutor for the Hokage's grandson. He wore the standard Konoha blue shirt without the flak jacket, along with the bandanna style headband like the other two special jounin. Underlying his tone was a hint of wariness. Although most elite jounin were rational did not despise the container of the Nine-Tails, there were many that had grievances with the boy's atrocious behavior in the past.

Iruka, who had unconsciously stood up in shock earlier, sat back down in a daze.

O O O

After he woke up in the late afternoon, Kakashi's fellow jounin flocked to him in the hospital to get the juicy details. Unfortunately, all he had to say was, "Hm…as ninjas, we need to look underneath the underneath." Then he went back to reading.

Guy also made a visit and yelled, "KAKASHI! My eternal rival! I hear you have taken on MOST YOUTHFUL students!"

Kakashi put down the book he was reading and focused on Guy. "Hey, Guy…our last score was 49-49, right?"

"Yes, my rival?"

"Let's have a spar when I get out."

Guy thrust a fist up in the air. "YOSH! Your fires of youth are stoking hot today!"

O O O

— _Two days later_

Late afternoon, Team 7 stood at the training grounds after a day's worth of D-rank missions.

Kakashi looked over the three new genin. There was a tense silence which had been the norm since he first met this team in the Academy classroom. But this silence was clearly different from before the bell test.

Sasuke looked like he was about to burst into rage at any moment. His fists were continuously clenching when he thought nobody was looking, or maybe it was just an unconscious reaction. He had been like this throughout the few D-rank missions they'd gone on so far, but he had never openly voiced any complaints.

Sakura was also uncharacteristically quiet compared to her Academy profile. When she looked at Naruto or Kakashi there were sometimes traces of fear. Clearly the bell test's numerous traumas were taking a toll on her.

Lelouch had switched the orange jumpsuit for a green ninja vest and black ninja pants in the standard Konoha style. He simply had a bored look on him.

With a lazy eye, Kakashi drawled, "Seems like you three are taking to ninja life pretty well…most teams start complaining on the first mission."

Sasuke's face darkened. If he didn't know how strong the man was he would've slugged this sorry excuse for a teacher.

"We did a lot of good work so far. Cleaning up garbage, pulling weeds, fixing a house, clearing a rat infestation…When I was a genin I don't think my team ever managed to do so much in one day. Quite impressive." The jounin continued seemingly without noticing Sasuke's mood.

Sakura's brows twitched. It was obvious by now that their teacher was deliberately provoking them. However, she knew what the purpose of the D-rank missions was and simply counted her blessings that Kakashi didn't seem to strongly protest to the village their reported version of the bell test proceedings.

"Well…alright. I know what you are all thinking inside. But I am genuinely impressed. You have done well to cooperate and do the missions without complaint. Unfortunately, we will need to continue doing these for some time, until we reach the quota required for all genin," Kakashi finally informed them after getting no reaction from his provocations.

Then he made a shooing gesture. "That's it for today then. Dismissed." And promptly disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

Sasuke immediately walked off on his own as fast as he could without looking unnatural.

Sakura gave him a glance before shifting to look at Naruto. Yesterday everybody had gone off on their own but today Naruto just stood there, still facing where Kakashi had been standing.

"Sasuke." Lelouch called out without turning.

Sasuke's steps simply continued as if he didn't hear anything.

"You're bored of this so-called teamwork training too, aren't you?" Lelouch asked.

Sasuke's footsteps came to a stop.

"It might help us get used to working together, but it doesn't help us get any stronger," said Lelouch.

Sasuke stood still without moving.

"Let's have a spar." Lelouch turned around with a smirk to face the other boy.

The black-haired genin also turned to face his teammate. His eyes seemed to show a kind of deep hunger as he stared at the other genin.

"Taijutsu only," Lelouch said.

Sasuke furrowed his brows. "Why?"

"We're not good enough yet to hold back with more dangerous techniques. It's fine against a veteran like Kakashi-sensei, but I'm sure you don't want to explain why we're too injured to complete missions tomorrow."

"Fine." Without further ado, Sasuke adopted the seal of confrontation, which was mirrored by Lelouch.

"Then I'll…referee?" Sakura said hesitantly as she glanced between the two.

O O O

Lelouch was soundly defeated. Sasuke's level of taijutsu skill was far beyond Lelouch's, to the point where Lelouch estimated that Sasuke could defeat any number of clones sent to gang up on him, at least until Sasuke was exhausted.

There was a large gap between them in strength, physique, and most importantly, skill. Although Lelouch's current body had a lot of endurance and stamina, Sasuke was faster and had more lean muscle.

The two of them formed the seal of reconciliation.

"Still weak as ever, dead-last," Sasuke scoffed. He barely broke a sweat against Naruto's abominable brawling technique.

"What, unsatisfied? You want a bigger challenge?" Lelouch asked.

"Ten of you wouldn't be a challenge to me," Sasuke replied haughtily.

"You're right. I need a good opponent to train taijutsu though." Lelouch admitted unabashedly.

"Then next time…come at me with everything. The way you fought Kakashi. I need that kind of opponent…If you do that, I'll consider training with you in taijutsu," Sasuke said with piercing eyes.

That was what Lelouch was waiting for. But he paused as if considering the proposal. "So be it. We'll go out all one day and alternate with taijutsu the next day. But we need to prepare blunted weapons and non-lethal explosive tags, until we get much stronger or learn medical jutsu."

Sasuke grunted his assent.

What about you Sakura?" Lelouch turned to the last member of their team.

"Huh? Me?" Sakura asked in return. "But I'm not much of an opponent, you two can defeat me easily…." She squirmed under Naruto's gaze. After seeing Naruto "kill" Kakashi-sensei, and having a blade to her throat held by one of Naruto's transformed clones, she held no more delusions about her position in the team. There was also the mysterious way Naruto became genin and could simply barge into the Hokage's office at any time like it was perfectly natural. She simply couldn't see him in the same light anymore.

"All the more reason for you to train with us. If you don't get stronger the gap will grow and you'll just become a burden to the team," said Lelouch.

Sakura's expression fell even more as she internally agreed that she would just be a burden.

Lelouch walked over and put a hand on her shoulder. "We're a team now so we need to help each other. Don't be ashamed, powerlessness is not a crime! In this world, people are not born equal. Some are naturally taller, more beautiful, have special chakra…but none of that matters! Time flows constantly, it doesn't care about the people who are struggling. No matter what they were born with, those who fail to act are doomed to die a slow death, while only those who willing to dirty their hands can have a chance to fulfill their hearts' desires!"

Sakura looked at the blonde boy in amazement. As she looked into his solemn eyes, she thought for a second she heard an eagle's fierce battle cry.

"You will become strong!" Lelouch's tone brooked no argument.

Sakura absentmindedly nodded.

O O O

Lelouch walked back to his apartment.

He entered through the door, shut it behind him, and moved through the short hall towards his living room on the left, preparing to take a rest before making dinner.

Just as he walked a few steps, he heard a voice coming from behind him.

"You've really changed, Naruto."

Lelouch stopped and turned his head quickly, but without any jerkiness to give the appearance that he wasn't startled.

He saw Kakashi with his back leaning against the wall beside the door, his arms crossed over his chest, looking back at him. Even though there was clearly nobody in the hall as Lelouch shut the door earlier, Kakashi looked as if he'd been there all along.

"Ah, Kakashi-sensei. I wasn't expecting you. Please, come in and have a seat." Lelouch slightly widened his eyes before replying smoothly with a smile, as if it were just a normal guest instead of somebody that just broke in without permission.

Kakashi's face was an unreadable blank. "Or maybe I should call you something else? Who are you, really?" He made no indication of having heard Lelouch's invitation.

There was a moment of silence as the two observed each other.

'He chose to confront me in this short hall because there's nothing that could be used to make an escape, and in this narrow space Shadow Clones won't do any good before he reaches me with his speed,' Lelouch quickly determined. 'But is he taking action by himself or are the higher ups in on this?'

'No signs of guilty fear when I suddenly appeared without warning, but his reaction was way too calm. Even if I'm wrong, the natural thing to think would be that I came here privately for revenge, but he doesn't even seem even a little guarded,' Kakashi quickly determined. 'Could it be that he's concealing an ace that could defeat me outright here?'

Lelouch's smile turned into a smirk. Then he let out a low chuckle. "What makes you think I was more than just _enlightened_ from the Forbidden Scroll incident and the knowledge of the Nine-Tails?"

Kakashi tensed almost imperceptibly. "A shocking event like that can't change all your mannerisms overnight. Your walking gait, speech intonation patterns, reactive use of vocabulary, these are all formed from years of habit, not something you can just decide to change on a whim."

"You know much more about me than a new teacher would. I suppose there was a reason you were assigned to Team 7. Still, what you've said isn't proof of anything…some special individuals can indeed change these things at will," Lelouch pointed out.

"Ninja arts can accomplish wonders nobody can imagine. There's no such thing as proof beyond doubt in our profession. However," Kakashi uncrossed his arms and lifted his left hand up to his drooping headband. "It is said there exist Three Great Doujutsu whose sight can pierce the truth of the world, and Konoha possesses all except the one considered to be just a myth."

Lelouch felt a sudden tension, as if somebody was holding a gun to his head. He watched with trepidation as Kakashi's headband unveiled the eye covered underneath.

A blood red iris with three black tomoe.

"With my Sharingan, I can see the surface qualities of your chakra that permeates the skin. And I can see that your chakra is markedly more chaotic and dark. An individual's unique chakra signature is formed over time by its Yin and Yang composition as spiritual and physical energies. The amount of change in your chakra would have needed years to accumulate," said Kakashi.

The red eye was spinning slowly and mesmerizingly and Lelouch could almost feel a tangible force pressing down on him, forcing him to be unable to look away. He marveled that this world could have something to so easily see the signs that his presence in this body was unnatural.

He could feel something stirring deep within himself.

Meanwhile, Kakashi was also marvelling at what he was seeing this time. When he had revealed the Sharingan, at first he saw the same surface chakra qualities that led to his determination that Naruto had changed too much to be the same person, barring the activation of some special bloodlines or secret powers.

Now suddenly the chakra seemed to come alive, surging through and forming an invisible (to the regular eye) layer that surrounded every inch of Lelouch's body, without releasing any excess or even chakra pressure beyond it.

It was a deep purple that seemed so thick and concentrated as to be solid. Chakra gathering in such scale should normally be visible even to the naked eye, such as a certain renowned technique Kakashi had modified from his own genin teacher the Fourth Hokage.

But in this case it was almost as if the purple layer wasn't quite chakra but something else, for it was so concentrated that it lacked even the microscopic gaps and flares of normal chakra.

It was…

 _Majestic._

 _Eternal._

 _Infinite._

Those were the thoughts that immediately and unintentionally sprung to mind.

As Kakashi was mesmerized by the strange phenomenon, Lelouch found himself lost in a vision.

 _Nine pillars in a circle formation stretched up and down as far as the eye can see, a magenta atmosphere and white fog gathered in cloud-like forms floating about, stone platforms hanging in the air with shifting staircases moving between them._

 _Three individuals stood on the biggest central platform. High above them was suspended a giant structure made of interwoven metal shafts formed into the approximate outline of a sphere. Inside was a bright mass of light with a connection to eight of the nine pillars. Of the nine pillars, one was dim and seemingly non-functional._

 _There was also a line of light connecting downwards._

 _The three individuals stood surrounding the position of the line of light. Lelouch could make out two of them as his long time accomplice C.C. and the captain of his former royal guard Jeremiah Gottwald, but the last one was blurred and he couldn't tell._

 _Then he saw what was at the light._

 _It was a rectangular box-like object, with something inside._

 _A corpse in extravagant white robes with a peaceful expression on its face._

 _The corpse of Lelouch vi Britannia, 99_ _th_ _emperor of the Holy Britannian Empire._

The vision faded.

On Kakashi's side, he was beginning to feel out of his depth. What he had just seen just now, although it was strange and different from anything he had seen before, there was one thing he could be sure of.

The boy in front of him had chakra of such potency to match or exceed the levels typically only found in S-rank ninja or the Five Shadows!

Kakashi had estimated previously that Naruto had about four times his own chakra, an amount which could be said to be on the upper ceiling of elite jounin. It was impressive but understandable given the circumstances of Naruto's birth. Kakashi himself had also been out of shape for quite a while after he left the ANBU corps several years ago and was far from his peak when he had about triple the chakra he did now.

But nonetheless, he was shocked! Because the gulf between A-rank ninja like himself and S-rank ninja like the Shadows and Sannin was truly vast.

Although it was not true that one needed incredible chakra reserves to be considered S-rank, it was true that ranking somebody below S when they had such reserves was seriously questionable, because those reserves fueled the uses of extremely devastating S-rank techniques. Even Jinchuuriki did not wield such chakra unless they could openly unleash the full power of their Tailed Beasts.

Kakashi knew very well his position in the village. Based on his peak abilities, he was widely rumored to be the strongest jounin in Konoha below the Sannin.

In Konoha, there were only 3 true S-rank ninja now. These were the Hokage, Jiraiya of the Sannin, and the Hokage's old teammate Danzo of the Darkness. Other than these, there were two ninja that could temporarily achieve S-rank threat level. These were Chouza Akimichi after eating the Rainbow Supreme Pill (actually, the existence of this secret pill has never been confirmed, but it is widely speculated), and Might Guy after releasing the 7th Celestial Gate (similarly, nobody has seen Guy using anything more than the 6th Gate, but Kakashi is quite sure he has achieved it).

And Kakashi knew very well that he stood zero chance against any of them should they use their full S-rank capabilities. He would be defeated in an instant, because the gap was just that large.

'Is this the power of the Nine-Tails? But that chakra should be boiling red and filled with hate,' he wondered in confusion.

The two of them returned to their senses at almost the same time.

"To think that you had such a power, Kakashi-sensei. You were really holding back on us, huh?" Lelouch broke the silence first. "But I suppose there's no point in denying it then. You are right, I am not the Naruto you all knew. But, you should know the seal of the Nine-Tails is still on me and can be easily verified, so I am curious, who do you think I am, if not Naruto?"

Naturally, Kakashi was aware of this. The Sharingan could not see past the chakra that naturally seeps at the surface, but Konoha's _other_ Great Doujutsu, the Byakugan, could see through a person's whole body, and even into seals to some extent.

That was why Naruto hadn't been immediately secretly hit with Yamanaka mind techniques to probe the truth. Somehow, even though he couldn't be the same person as before, he also was not an imposter. Barring something truly outlandish which was always possible with ninja, that led to a somewhat obvious but equalling befuddling conclusion.

"Are you the Nine-Tails that broke the seal and took over? But I can't imagine why you haven't destroyed Konoha yet and instead are staying in a human body and playing at being ninja, if that was true," though he knew it was farfetched, Kakashi tossed a brick and waited for the jade.

Lelouch answered with a deep, malevolent cackle.

"Don't put me in the same category as a mindless beast." Lelouch finally said after he finished his villainous laugh. "I am much greater than that."

Lelouch raised his head slightly as if in pride.

"I was born innocent and pure. But the world was too savage and heartless. There was a time when I believed that my parents died for a good cause," Lelouch began narrating the truth. Indeed, he had never been more satisfied than the so-called Gods erased Charles and Marianne by his command.

"There was a time that I believed I had people who cared about me." That was Nunnally, the light of his life.

"That I had a purpose to struggle towards despite the hardship." To obliterate Britannia! As he solemnly swore before Suzaku on the battlefields of Japan during the invasion of 2010 A.T.B.

"But time showed me the truth. I was nothing more than a powerless corpse going through the motions of living. For as long as I can remember, I've been living a lie. My name is a lie. My background is a lie." Whether it was the false peace of Aries Villa or living as Lelouch Lamperouge, they were all lies.

"I'm not an Uzumaki with red hair. My parents weren't heroes. Nobody loves me!" Of course, he had learned some things he could make use of regarding this body's previous owner as well.

Although he was fairly sure the person in front of him wasn't Naruto, Kakashi still felt the urge to protest all three of those declarations. He felt deeply offended on behalf of Naruto's parents.

Lelouch's face turned dark and his voice rose. "For so long, I didn't understand why. I searched for the truth desperately while denying what was right in front of my eyes!" Even though he told the Black Knights his goal was to liberate Japan, from the beginning his true purpose was to uncover the truth behind Marianne's assassination and Charles' complete disregard for it, before obtaining justice and a gentle world for Nunnally.

"Starvation, filth, decay, constant war and fear, we're just rats running in a wheel known as world."

"I was a pathetic child that refused to accept reality! I was just a pawn for others with ambitions of power!" He and Nunnally were sent to Japan as expendable hostages to lower Japan's guard before the invasion. Yet, it all seemed so foolish of him to desire justice for Marianne when the damn woman was alive in Anya and didn't do anything to stop Charles from carpet bombing the Kururugi residence, all because their dead children would obviously be _back_ after completing Ragnarok.

"And yet, I – no, _Naruto Uzumaki_ trudged on, day after day, pretending that he was just a simple orphan of heroes that died fighting the Nine-Tails, pretending to be a dim-witted, attention craving, rowdy child like any other and not a vessel for the monster that supposedly killed his parents. How absurd." Lelouch spat out the words disdainfully.

"But one day…the truth could no longer be denied." Lelouch's face returned to a slight smile. "For the truth was finally told straight to him."

"Yes…on that day, the lie of _Naruto Uzumaki_ ended…because he realized… _ **he never existed**_." The last part was said with a deep and hard voice, in contrast to his cheery expression.

Lelouch swept out his arms in a dramatic gesture. His eyes widened and his smile grew wide.

Kakashi on the other hand, grew increasingly disturbed as he understood what this rant was implying.

"That's right! From the very beginning, It wasn't me that was wrong! _It was the world_!" As Lelouch's voice rose continuously, his speech turned into a shout at the end.

"And _**I**_ , _**Zero**_ , have emerged from the darkness to change _everything_!"

As he continued to observe the manic boy, who seemed to be consumed by a lengthy fit of shaking cackling complete with bloodshot bulging eyes, Kakashi came to his conclusion.

'This is an extremely severe case of dissociative identity disorder. No, it might even be more than that. This new personality is highly unstable and dangerous. I need to report to Lord Hokage and consult with our psychiatric specialists as soon as possible,' Kakashi thought.

O O O

AN: _Toss a brick to get a jade gem_ – Strategem #17, this is the art of using baits to entice the enemy and giving up something of lower value to gain something much greater, or giving up some real information such that the opponent comes to a lengthy (and hopefully wrong) deduction causing a critical error that can be capitalized. It originated from a non-military scenario, in which a budding poet desired to complete a poem and wrote his incomplete verses on a wall in a temple that he knew a master poet was going to visit. As he expected, the master poet was intrigued with the incomplete verses upon seeing them and finished them. It's now also an idiom that refers to throwing out incomplete ideas during brainstorming.

The title stratagem will be in the spotlight for several chapters. Some other strategems will also feature but I'm only going to do an official review of the title stratagem at the end of these chapters.

Answers to last chapter's question on the examples of the title stratagem _Cover the sky to cross the ocean_ :

1\. Lelouch testing his geass on Iruka while pretending to give information on Mizuki's plan.

2\. Lelouch suspected that the Third had faked being defeated by Sexy Jutsu and was actually monitoring him. He pretended to nearly commit suicide while his real goal was to prove his loyalty because a real spy would need to transmit the secrets of the Forbidden Scroll before offing himself.

3\. The bell test is a version of this, hiding the goal of assessing teamwork behind capturing the bells.

4\. When Lelouch first attacked Kakashi solo, it appeared to be testing the waters to gauge Kakashi's capabilities, while Lelouch hid his trump card ability shadow clones. In reality, it was to disguise his level of skill in stealth and keep Kakashi focused on the actions that Lelouch wanted to show.

5\. The fake Kakashi and enemy ninja used the surface goal of capturing Sasuke to give Lelouch an opening to take down true Kakashi.

6\. The entire plan to take down true Kakashi was masking the true goal to make Kakashi tell Sakura and Sasuke the answer to the test before time was up instead of fruitlessly trying to persuade them himself while Lelouch had no credibility. The poison itself could also qualify for this, but it would be more appropriate to classify it under " _Openly repair the galley roads and sneak through Chencang_ ", because the poison was a different path to achieve the same goal to take down Kakashi, rather than a different goal.

A lot was covered in the story dialogue as well, and some was subtly implied. **In general, I will try create situations where the strategies are revealed directly after the fact in-story, to ensure that everyone can follow what really happened.** Also just going off of the response to last chapter, everyone thought Lelouch was awesome but nobody tried to answer the challenge question so I guess it was just too hard? But don't worry, if you keep following along, you can learn to be like Lelouch too…maybe…


	3. 3 - Toss a brick to get a jade gem 2

**Chapter 3** – **Toss a brick to get a jade gem 2**

— _Late night_

At the Hokage's house, Kakashi and Shikaku sat across from Hiruzen, each on couch, their faces solemn.

"I never imagined this would be the result when I decreed that the secret of the sealing be protected from the younger generation and Naruto," Hiruzen murmured with a sigh.

"Hokage-sama, it is not your fault," Kakashi immediately replied.

He furrowed his brows. "Even though Inoichi verified my initial thoughts, I'm getting the feeling that something's not quite right about this explanation."

"According to Inoichi, his behavior and change in chakra signature could match a long-term dissociated personality buried beneath the surface one." The Hokage looked at Kakashi questioningly.

"I can't pinpoint why, but when I replay that conversation in my mind, I feel as if this is only what this… _Zero_ wants us to think." Kakashi voiced his concern.

Hiruzen was silent for a moment, then he said, "I have the same feeling, but what are we missing?" Then he looked pointedly at Shikaku, who had been deep in thought the whole time.

Shikaku seemed not to notice, staring off into nowhere.

"He planned everything…" He murmured with a hint of admiration.

Hiruzen raised an eyebrow. "Shikaku?" He asked loudly.

The jounin commander blinked. "Ah, Hokage-sama?"

"Seems like you've figured something out. Care to explain?"

Shikaku looked between the other two ninja. "Yes. I'm certain that this was a calculated revelation. And not just this, everything since the Forbidden Scroll incident, it was all leading up to now."

He paused and let that sink in. "Zero has written a script for us. And we have no choice but to follow it."

Kakashi and Hiruzen leaned forward as they listened intently.

"A script we have to follow? What does that mean?" asked the Hokage.

Shikaku grabbed his teacup and took a sip first.

"Suppose that we don't accept this split personality explanation and take action against him. Can you predict what Zero will do?" He asked in return.

Hiruzen and Kakashi looked blankly at each other. Neither of them knew where Shikaku was going with this. Before being able to make a prediction like that, didn't they have to figure out Zero's true nature? Understand his goals and capabilities? But that was exactly what they were still investigating.

As if reading their minds, Shikaku continued. "We don't need to know Zero's true identity to predict this. He has already given us the answer."

Hiruzen saw Shikaku's smug expression and sighed internally. His advisor must have been bored for some time and was making the most of this new puzzle. Things had been fairly peaceful in the Leaf for the past couple of years. However, the Hokage said nothing to speed things up, as this exercise could prove useful for Kakashi's growth.

"Think back to everything Naruto has done since the Forbidden Scroll incident. First, he implied to Mizuki that the Scroll gave him the keys to the seal. Then, he nearly committed suicide before Hokage-sama stopped him. During the bell test, he heavily injured himself and took a hostage. What does this tell you?" Shikaku hinted.

After a short moment of thinking, Kakashi answered. "He can be very deceptive and cares more about results than the method used. He's not afraid of getting hurt or getting his hands dirty. That's what he said to Mizuki too, right? The only ones who should kill are those ready to be killed. But…are you suggesting that the suicide attempt was an act too?"

Shikaku nodded. "You're almost there, but you're focusing too much on analyzing the personality he's showing to us. Remember, I told you earlier, this is just his script and he's showing it to us on purpose. You'd realize it immediately if we actually pushed him into a corner."

As the Hokage mulled over Shikaku's words by himself, suddenly he froze and eyes widened.

Kakashi muttered as he racked his brain for the answer. "A script we have to follow…"

Shikaku's words replayed over and over in his mind.

… _keys to the seal…_

 _...suicide…_

… _took a hostage…_

O O O

Lelouch stood in the shadows of his bedroom and looked out at the moon through the window. He felt restless, despite being confident in his plan. Once, he had been an arrogant boy high on his first victories, underestimating the capabilities of an actually competent enemy commander. C.C. had told him as much, but he refused to listen. He remembered that moment as if it were only yesterday.

" _Don't go Lelouch. I can't have you dying before you fulfill your bargain."_

" _There's a contradiction between what you say and what you're doing, isn't there?" Lelouch asked of the girl pointing a gun at him._

" _I won't kill you. I'll just shoot you in the leg to quiet you down."_

" _I see. You can't use the Geass yourself, can you?"_

 _The girl glared at him and said nothing._

" _That's what I thought. If you could do it yourself, you wouldn't have asked me to do it." Lelouch pulls out his own gun and points it at C.C._

" _You think you can threaten me with a gun?" The girl scoffed. She was immortal, after all._

" _Yes, I can."_

 _The gun changed its target._

" _Until I met you, I was dead. A powerless corpse pretending to be alive…a life where I did nothing except going through the motions of day to day living. Like dying a slow death…if I must live as I did before, then…"_

 _He held the gun firmly to his own temple and started to press the trigger._

He learned an important lesson that day. He got what he wanted and went to Cornelia's trap. But in the end, C.C. had to save him from his failure.

After that, he would never underestimate his opponents again. From the moment he stepped into this world, he knew that beating the ninjas at their own game of subterfuge by pretending to be Naruto, when he barely knew anything about this strange magical place, was a futile endeavor. Not to mention Naruto's memories weren't stored properly, the emotions weren't there, and he had no way of checking if pieces were missing.

His expertise was in war, not espionage, even though that was one component of war.

He needed a different way to survive. And ironically, he was in a position to use the same tactic of threatening to kill himself again. But this time, it wouldn't be out of arrogance and foolishness.

Still, it wasn't guaranteed to work and he had to wonder…would he really do it?

He clenched his fist and narrowed his eyes. "No. I will come back and fulfill my contract, my witch. For the gift you gave me, I can do no less."

O O O

The room settled into a long silence.

Shikaku knew the two had understood at last, so he merely let them digest it.

"He would threaten to kill himself and release the Nine-Tails, thereby taking Naruto's body, and the whole Leaf village hostage…" Kakashi whispered.

"That's right. If we didn't see through this and rashly confronted him, then when he threatens to kill himself, we would realize based on his previous actions that he's unlikely to be bluffing. Of course, then we would also expose a key fact to him." Shikaku continued the discussion.

This time, Hiruzen was able to follow quickly. "Yes…when we inevitably back down from his threat, we would expose our own vulnerability. We have no good way to deal with a released Nine-Tails, at least not without enormous sacrifice. This is of course, assuming that he is even capable of releasing the seal."

"The problem is, even if he can't, can we be sure that the Nine-Tails will disperse if he just kills himself? Even if the other Tailed Beasts disperse that way, that situation has never been observed with the Nine-Tails, and we know it's unique among the nine – that's why it can't be sealed in an inanimate object, and only Uzumaki who've inherited the special chakra can be hosts. For all we know, it could reform immediately on the spot instead of taking years reform in a different place," Shikaku reminded.

"Is the Reaper Death Seal really our only choice? Couldn't Tenzo suppress it with the Wood Element?" Kakashi asked.

Hiruzen sighed. These were secrets getting above Kakashi's clearance level but since he was heavily involved and would need to watch Naruto in the future, he might as well hear it. "Tenzo will be helpful, but he will not be enough. Even the First Hokage could not fully suppress the Nine-Tails, hence why Mito-sama sealed it in herself. Only one person ever had the power to fully suppress and even control the Nine-Tails…if he were here the fox would be the least of our worries."

There was another long silence.

"Then…Zero is just pretending to be a split personality?" Kakashi broke the silence again.

"Not necessarily…everything he did was planned, but that doesn't mean it's fake, only that he's extremely intelligent and has great foresight. Moreover…keep in mind that he didn't have to give us all these hints. We would realize the risk anyway the moment he prepares to suicide, but he could've hidden his intelligence from us and avoided attention the whole time," Shikaku analyzed.

"Then why didn't he hide it? To express goodwill?" Kakashi asked.

"In a sense. Which is more dangerous, a country that tells us they have terrible weapons that they will use on us if we attack, or a country that doesn't admit to having any but our spies tell us they just sent S-class ninja into our territory?"

"The latter." Kakashi nodded as he understood Shikaku's analogy comparing Zero to the defensive country.

"Zero could still be a split personality, just too smart for his own good and decided to weave this elaborate plan instead of trusting us. After all, how does he know that we won't try to force his original personality to resurface? This way, he maintains control by giving us the stick and carrot treatment. Mutual destruction, or we get an extremely talented ninja. For now, there's not much else we can do," Shikaku summarized.

O O O

— _One month later_

Lelouch was holding a book in his hands.

 _Long ago, before ninjutsu, there walked upon the land a grotesque monster of unimaginable power, which the people called the One-Eyed God. It was rarely sighted but when it was, it brought either terrible disaster or great blessings to some lucky individuals. But usually, it brought disasters that would decimate entire kingdoms. One day, a great hero appeared, wielding the power of chakra. He who bore the Rinnegan and controlled all the elements like a god, battled the One-Eyed God for seven days and seven nights. The two gods could not overcome each other, until the hero decided to sacrifice himself, sealing the evil within his own body and becoming the first jinchuuriki. He spent the rest of his life spreading to the people the gift of chakra, and from his teachings arose the ninja and samurai arts. So the age of kings ended, while the age of ninja and samurai began._

'Rinnegan…Samsara? The Japanese characters for Rinne could mean the cycles of reincarnation and transmigration, but if traced by to the original Sanskrit it was derived from, it also means _wandering_ or _world_. Just a coincidence or could it mean something deeper in this world too?' Lelouch stared at the word for a moment. He skimmed through the rest of the pages and found nothing else of interest. Finished reading, he put it back on the shelf of the Konoha Library.

Elsewhere, a horde of Naruto clones were practicing various chakra control exercises Lelouch had bought from the Ninja Development Office.

A lone Naruto looked over the training clones while playing three separate shogi matches against three clones.

'Too inefficient. An out of this world mystery like mine would only be solved by scouring the world … it's the same old problem. What I need … is an army! A army that be can be my eyes and ears, an army to crush opponents that stand in my way. These clones are useful but their weaknesses are many. Not as intelligent as the original, pop with the slightest destabilization, and they don't last more than a few hours.' Lelouch thought to himself as he compared his makeshift army to the riff raff of the Shinjuku and Saitama terrorist groups before he formed the Black Knights.

'But…how do I form an army that is more than just chakra-less fodder? Training them from children would take an astronomical amount of resources and time. I'm starting to see why no feudal lords here ever attempted an edict of unam sanctum (Footnote 1).' At times like these, Lelouch really missed the convenience of Geass.

Ever since that vision he saw of C.C. and Jeremiah, he was invigorated and speculated that he still had some connection to his old world. In fact, there was a strong possibility that C.C. had something to do with his transmigration, or maybe she knew about it and was trying to reach him.

Although he had planned on researching for a way to return anyways, he didn't have any direction until the vision, and in any case he had to spend time building his identity during the first few days.

But now, instead of searching blindly for things related to Gods, dimensions, reincarnation, etc, he knew that the vision was provoked by the Sharingan, and that he himself was probably still connected to Geass, Code, or C's World in general. The vision he saw was exactly the kind of psychic resonance that C.C. could induce, except it obviously wasn't intentional on Kakashi's part.

It was even more intriguing that these extremely powerful bloodline limits manifested in the eyes, just like Geass. The only problem was that there was no public information regarding the Sharingan that implied any extra-dimensional capabilities or a connection to life, death, reincarnation. It was the Rinnegan instead whose capabilities most intrigued Lelouch but that one was considered a myth.

Nonetheless, Lelouch had learned some interesting things that made him think he was on the right track.

For example, a high level Sharingan user could "see" an opponent's moves very slightly in advance. That was basically Bismarck Waldstein's Geass.

Then there was the ability to hypnotize people, a weaker version of the Geasses of Absolute Obedience that Lelouch had or Absolute Submission that Marrybell mel Britannia had, one of the Imperial Family that followed Lelouch without being subjugated with Geass.

Of course, the rumors that Sharingan could control the Tailed Beasts was very much like Absolute Submission.

Lelouch's fake brother during the one year after Charles replaced his memories, Rolo, also had a Geass whose power was covered by the Sharingan's most basic genjutsu, which was aptly named, "Sharingan: Genjutsu" which effectively stuns an opponent into a state of unawareness momentarily.

Of course, the ninja arts really were capable of incredible things, and many Geass abilities that were documented in the Geass Order were no doubt mimicked by other ninjutsu. Nonetheless, combined with the odd reaction when Kakashi unveiled his Sharingan, it did not seem like a mere coincidence.

He had already exhausted the easy leads though, and now it would be far more difficult to find the information he needed.

He continued his search.

O O O

"Hokage-sama, please let me track down Mizuki!" Iruka knelt in front of the Hokage's desk and pleaded.

"I understand how you feel, Iruka, but those feelings will only get in the way. If you feel responsible for not seeing your friend's true colors sooner, I have a better mission for you." The Hokage replied with a face full of sympathy.

"A better mission?" Iruka wondered out loud.

"That's right…you know what really happened that night, and as of now, we don't know whether the scroll was Mizuki's true goal. Perhaps he was covering the sky to cross the ocean. We need a loyal shinobi like you to watch the stars behind the veil," The old man said wisely.

Iruka blinked blankly, obviously not understanding the obtuse metaphors.

"Sigh…I am talking about Naruto. There is evidence to suggest Mizuki was not acting alone," The Hokage explained.

Comprehension dawned on the chuunin, and he vigorously affirmed his acceptance of the new mission.

After Iruka left the office, a scarred man who looked like an older version of Shikamaru stepped out from the shadows.

"What do you make of these two, Shikaku?" The Hokage said without turning to look at the newcomer.

"It seems a bit too convenient…If Tsubaki really was just an aggrieved fiancée, why tell us about the connection to Orochimaru, which makes his crime even more severe?" Shikaku replied with his deductions.

—The day after Mizuki's scheduled execution was announced

 _A short-haired kunoichi with light green hair burst into the Hokage's office in tears._

" _Hokage-sama…please, I know Mizuki's commited a terrible crime, but he's just misguided! Can't you reconsider?" The woman begged while on her knees._

" _You are…?" The village leader squinted at the unfamiliar face._

" _I'm Tsubaki, Mizuki's fiancée. He used to be a good man! But ever since the time he met that person, he's changed! It's all that devil's fault!" Her face twisted with hate._

" _Who did he meet? Who is this devil that changed him?" The hokage leaned forward._

" _He called himself Orochimaru of the Sannin!" The woman cried out as if clinging on to her last hope._

 _The Hokage stood up at once. It had been far too long since he'd heard anything about his traitorous student. "Tell me everything."_

—In the present at the Hokage's office

Shikaku continued his analysis.

"From what we know of Orochimaru, he would cut his losses and discard a useless pawn like Mizuki. So she isn't likely to be working for him. Either Tsubaki is really much more devious than she's shown in the past, or somebody behind the scenes is trying to kill with a borrowed sword. I'd lean towards the latter…but Orochimaru's been laying low for so long there's no intel on what other enemies he could possibly have that would also have the capacity to plant such a deep spy in Konoha. As for Iruka…he's a simple man…maybe he'll learn a thing or two from his old student."

O O O

At the Konoha Correctional Facility, a glasses-wearing young man with white hair was walking through the dungeons with his fellow medics, who were here to check up on the wounds of the guards.

As the group passed the cell that previously held Mizuki, the young man observed the fallout from the prison break.

The cell was undamaged but empty and unlocked. There were traces of blood on the bars.

Not far away, two other cells were ripped apart, and the walls showed signs of physical trauma.

'Hm…as I thought,' he mentally affirmed with a piercing look. 'No other convict escaped in the riot the stupid brothers made. That means…'

O O O

For Team 7, the rest of the month after the bell test passed quietly.

As Kakashi had secretly swore to himself he would teach these kids a lesson…ahem, _many_ lessons, Team 7 was forced to do continuous D-ranks to practice teamwork, with no down time or other training in between, and Naruto was not allowed to use Shadow Clones on these missions.

That said, Lelouch's shadow clone activities could not be restricted outside these missions, and they were industriously working towards Lelouch's other plans, which mainly revolved around gathering information and increasing his personal combat potential.

Lelouch didn't mind that Kakashi didn't teach them any specific techniques. He suspected that jounin instructors had no obligation to pass down any techniques. Jutsu were highly guarded secrets in this world, and often restricted to clan members. Ranked ninja could purchase appropriate village technique scrolls, and but most had mission record requirements, or even needed contribution points which were accumulated from missions (ie, one scroll might require 5 B-rank missions completed so if you did 5 you could buy any number of these, but another might require "spending" contribution points from 5 B-Rank missions and after buying it you wouldn't have the points to buy more of this type). They also didn't come cheap in terms of Ryo, which was this world's currency.

Fortunately all ranked ninja had the right to take missions independently as long as it didn't interfere with their team obligations. Retrained genin who failed the jounin sensei test simply didn't have a permanent team and therefore had no particular team obligations, but did have mission quotas to meet. As a result, Lelouch had used Shadow Clones to complete additional D-rank missions whenever they were available.

Each day after their missions, the three genin of Team 7 would train together and spar. Lelouch had yet to defeat Sasuke even once in taijutsu, and less could be said for Sakura, but nonetheless they were improving. They varied their sessions with other kinds of training, such as group battles with Shadow Clones, long range shuriken/kunai slug fests, etc. They also had a few "all-out" battles which inevitably ended in Lelouch's victory. There had been fewer than the agreed upon amount because these "all-out" battles were nowhere near as exciting as the bell test. Lelouch, knowing that he could not defeat Sasuke head on, simply used stall tactics, hiding, and the Replacement Jutsu repeatedly until Sasuke was tired and showed an opening. To Sasuke's annoyance, Lelouch merely explained "I only have so many tricks" to be used. That was actually true, however, because it's difficult to get the same person to fall for the same deceptions more than once.

Close to the end of the month, Kakashi suddenly informed his students that they would be taking on a C-rank mission.

"Your teamwork has made adequate progress and given your skill levels, it's time to try something a bit more difficult," Kakashi explained at the training grounds where they typically met up. He was only an hour late this time.

"This mission starts three days from now, and will take us out of Konoha, so we are going to do some special training today and you will have a couple of days to yourselves to make your own preparations," he continued.

"Hm. It's about time," Sasuke stated plainly. He was more than ready for this.

"First, I'll explain the mission," Kakashi ignored him and passed tossed out a scroll which unfurled itself on the ground. The students huddled around to get a look.

"Recently trade between Wave Country and Fire Country has slowed to a crawl, as shipping prices have skyrocketed along with pirate activity. A group of merchants that deal in imported goods from Wave have commissioned us to scout the area and find out where these pirates are coming from, and if possible, to enter Wave and ask the Wave Daimyo's court what they are doing about it," Kakashi summarized for them.

"This is a C-rank mission? If the pirates have ninja or if there's some other power behind this, wouldn't it be too difficult for genin to handle?" Lelouch asked with furrowed brows.

"Well, you're right. That's why this is only a scouting mission, and the reward is 150,000 ryo, about double the average C-rank. If we find presence of enemy ninja, we can retreat and report back, good intel is all that's necessary to complete the mission," said Kakashi.

Sasuke looked disappointed upon hearing that they wouldn't be fighting enemy ninja.

Sakura breathed a sigh of relief. She had taken her practical ninja skills much more seriously over the past month, but didn't think she was ready for a showdown just yet…

"I picked this mission because it will be a good chance for you guys to see what's outside the village, better understand the role of ninja in the Elemental Nations, and there might be some light action against pirates. If we're lucky, the Wave administration might offer us a higher ranked mission request for large scale operations against the pirates, which you'll get a cut of the rewards if Konoha decides to take it." Although he looked more like a hoodlum with his mask, drooping headband, and wild hair, it could be seen that he did take his teaching responsibilities seriously.

"Now then, let's get started on our training. We'll learn a technique to climb trees."

"Huh? But we already know how to do that, Kakashi-sensei!" Sakura protested.

Kakashi looked at her and gave a closed eye smile. "Then can you do this?" He said as he walked over to a nearby tree and walked up with his hands in his pockets as if the tree was no different than the ground.

O O O

"Yes…this is it! This is the power I've been looking for! Hahahaha!" A manic laughter could be heard from inside a cave hidden somewhere in Fire Country.

Shortly after, Mizuki could be seen walking out of the cave, his skin covered in flame-like black sealing script, his muscles having noticeably bulked up and the skin tone much darker than before. He suddenly rushed forward towards a nearby boulder with close to jounin-level speeds and fearlessly smashed into it with his fist!

And the boulder was blown apart in a huge cloud of smoke, with Mizuki himself none the worse for wear once the smoke cleared away. Satisfied, Mizuki quickly moved away again.

A few minutes later, a kunoichi wearing a grey trench coat with netted black leggings dropped down from somewhere and entered the cave. This was Anko Mitarashi, special jounin of Konoha.

Her purple hair swung vibrantly as she dashed forward towards the end which held some assorted medicinal tools, a sealing formation, and some sparse instructions carved into the ground.

'It really is the cursed seal...! Will he lead us straight to Orochimaru?' Anko thought.

O O O

A few days later, Team 7 had set out on their mission. As they moved through the treetops, they were able to reach the seaside on the eastern border of Fire country in just two days. Sakura was exhausted from the massive chakra consumption, and even Sasuke didn't look so good, as he hadn't fully mastered the tree walking exercise yet. Naruto and Kakashi were none the worse for wear, but they were considerate and allowed frequent rests in between.

As they approached the port village of Umita, the group of four disguised themselves with Henge. The nearby port and surrounding lands were the administrated by a lord of the Hiigiri clan, who was known as the Lord _Shugodai_ , meaning representative of the Daimyo. As a small port village, it did not have a castle but was nonetheless guarded by a Samurai lord that held a significant amount of local land.

There was a single guard at the gates of the palisade which ran around the western edge of the village. Security in non-ninja villages and minor fiefs was extremely low so the guard didn't ask much, only what their business was and took a small bribe to let them through without close scrutiny. Most peasants didn't have any identification in the first place, or even last names, so there wouldn't have been much to check anyway.

The disguised group consisting of a martial priest and three apprentices strolled in and wandered around.

Compared to bustling Konoha, this place was sparsely populated. The marketplace was simply a large open square. Houses were made of stone and wood. There were some larger shops with their own buildings, but the most notable buildings were the Samurai lord's residence, a barracks for the lord's troops which also doubled as the prison and tripled as a sort of police station, a few guild houses for merchants and other trades, and of course there was the lighthouse. Then there were the piers and array of ships docked at port.

They first went to the tavern to get some food and hear some gossip. Between the rambunctious drunkards, travelers, and fishermen, and mercenaries, they could overhear a few pieces of information.

O O O

A/N: _Toss a brick to get a jade gem_ is used mainly for information warfare in this chapter. Last chapter was used in the sense closest to the story of the unfinished poem. Next chapter will feature its use as a combat tactic.

Footnotes:

(1) Unam Sanctum – Latin for "One Holy". In 14th century Europe, long before Code Geass's major historical divergence at the Battle of Trafalgar, Pope Boniface VIII proclaimed authority over all Christian kings who were supposedly ruling by divine grace, for of the church "there is one body and one head, not two like a monster". A mercenary army assembled by the French king's advisor invaded Rome, their leaders were all excommunicated, but ultimately the Papacy was subjugated and forced to move to Avignon and effectively held hostage by France for decades. Lelouch is comparing the situation with countries having both a Daimyo and a Kage to the way kingdoms theoretically had both a temporal and spiritual leader that do not share the same interests.


	4. 4 - Toss a brick to get a jade gem 3

**Chapter 4 – Toss a brick to get a jade gem 3**

"I can't handle it anymore! Every time I go out there to the good spots, I see them pirate ships coming in. Won't even let my tiny little boat off, I'll be lucky to get half the usual harvest this season." one fisherman grumbled.

"Times are tough, eh, maybe the lord'll put together a force to teach those scum a lesson," another man at said while smacking his table.

"Count yourselves lucky boys, I came over from Water country and nearly lost my life. No clue how I'm gonna get back home at this rate," a man in clothes that seemed to have been soaked and dried without washing said.

"To hell with Ozen, he thinks he can just sit around and do nothing while those outlanders pick fights with our men and harass our women. I swear they can't be up to any good camped here like some kind of army instead of living in proper lodgings like regular people," a scarred and bulky man in leather armor with a huge war axe and shield on his back said after gulping down a big mug of something.

"Rengo, you shouldn't say that out loud. What if somebody here goes and tells him?" A woman wearing leather tunics and knee high boots replied.

From the stairs, three men wearing large straw hats and black overcoats walked down and exited the tavern.

As they hit the road outside, one of the men said, "Mizuki, when are we gonna get a big feast?"

"Just wait. You'll get it once we get to Wave."

Back inside the tavern, Sakura asked in a low voice, "Why do I feel like this place is lawless?"

"The world's a big place, Sakura, and everyone is struggling to survive. The lords don't have the manpower to keep order everywhere. Plus, there's only one hidden village but hundreds of other villages and towns in Fire Country." Kakashi answered in an equally low voice.

After that, they split up to gather additional information.

To avoid getting unwanted attention with too many people suddenly asking questions about the pirates, Lelouch didn't use Shadow Clones. He headed to the piers and asked around about prices for getting a ride to the Wave Country, which was effectively an island nation fairly close to the mainland. According to the sailors, the waters surrounding Wave had become extremely dangerous over the past two months so there weren't many ships sailing there, especially not without a good security force. Even the waters off the coast of the Fire Country and everything in between to Wave was risky. There were only two ships in port willing to even sail and only one already had a security force arranged.

For the pirates themselves, they were not to be underestimated. There were at least a fleet of ten ships currently operating, and all of them were heavily armed with some pirates capable of using a degree of chakra. They mostly targeted cargo ships though and aimed for the cargo itself rather than capturing ships. They could be fended off with an exorbitant crossing fee, and only took people prisoner if they could be ransomed or were young women.

As for the Fire Country navy, well the first sailor whom he'd asked just laughed at him and said, "Those fat bastards don't give a damn. Ships are mighty expensive to keep at sea, and no noble would do something as unprofitable as patrolling the waters."

After his basic reconnaissance, the team regrouped and shared their findings.

Sakura obtained information on trade goods from Wave and their prices. According to the local merchants, all Wave products had been equally targeted by the pirates. Moreover, several shipping companies had discontinued operations in Wave, the only left was Gato Company, which was extremely large, operating across the whole Elemental Nations and had an extensive private mercenary force to protect their operations along with some of the fastest ships around. Other than that, the only goods that were coming in were from loose ships from private groups who were willing to put together significant battle power for some reason or another and needed to cross to Wave or back. As a result, common trade goods that were not unique to Wave were now being supplied by other places, especially Water Country and Whirlpool Country.

Sasuke investigated the suspicious group camped on the north side of the village and found that they were a force of around fifty men all armed with basic weapon and armor. According to the man named Rengo and his mercenary team, nobody knew what these guys were doing but they were camped here for almost a month after sailing in from somewhere. The lord Samurai hadn't done anything about it because they paid some fees for putting up their tents. However, they had been stirring up trouble with the villagers with their arrogant attitudes. They had also been buying up medicinal herbs and non-perishable food items aggressively.

Kakashi got info directly from Samurai Ozen after revealing his rank. He and other local lords were in fact preparing a force to start patrols as soon as they received some additional funds from the Daimyo and were able to hire some Konoha shinobi, probably in a couple of months. He knew nothing about the camped group other than the fact that they had several shinobi of unknown affiliation in their ranks, so he did not want to provoke them. No ninja were spotted among the pirates, but they had ninja supplies, explosive tags, and incredibly, some of their ships seem to be outfitted with cannon, which is why the lord shokudai was not acting carelessly. There were also unconfirmed rumors that the Wave Daimyo had gone missing and sightings of shinobi from the hidden Mist village on the island of Wave.

Together Team 7 quickly decided on a course of action. Seeing as there were no clear signs of enemy ninja yet, they would proceed with the mission to uncover the source of the pirates by getting on a ship to Wave, where they would either meet the pirates or reach Wave and find out what happened to the Wave Daimyo. Thus, they found the captain of the ship that was preparing to sail tomorrow and got themselves hired as very cheap extra security after privately demonstrating some non-ninja combat skills.

O O O

The next morning all passengers boarded the ship named _Hardy Anchor_ , a double-masted hoy. The captain's own crew had ten hardened fighters, plus 15 hired guards, Rengo's team of four, and Team 7, making a total of 32 combat-capable troops, which was quite a huge force for a supposedly civilian ship, as the most merchant ships usually had less than five. Combat-capable members took up 2/3rds of the total passenger count, completely unheard of except on warships.

"Ah…I think I'm seasick," Sakura said while gripping tightly onto a wooden rail.

It was two hours into the voyage and part of team 7 was on deck near the crow's nest.

"Only seven hours left to go, little girl. Try to keep your eye on the horizon," advised the woman from Rengo's team, named Takumi. She was leaning back against the railing beside Sakura.

Kakashi was reading his book as usual while disguising it as piously reviewing scripture, while Sasuke sat beside the jounin on a bench with his arms rested on his knees and his hands cupped together in his standard posture.

Lelouch was sitting at a table in the shipboard dining hall. Beside him was the man from the tavern who had claimed to be from Water Country.

"Thanks for the coin, kid, never thought I'd become a charity case, but there's a first for everything," the man named Tenmaru said.

"How'd you end up like this?" Lelouch asked.

"Sigh…these waters are deeper than you think. I used to be the steward of a shokudai lord in Water Country. After the Water Daimyo was assassinated and civil war broke out, whole country's been a terrible mess. In the beginning, it was just between the ninjas, but soon enough the Mizukage flipped the country upside down looking for the people with special blood. And what do you know? A group of them were actually hiding in our lands and it became a warzone. My liege was killed and I got out of there as fast as I could, taking a ship to Wave where I have some relatives. But on the way, the ship was attacked by pirates and wrecked, I escaped floating on wreckage and drifted for a while before a passing lifeboat from survivors of another pirate attack picked me up," Tenmaru explained as he slowly savored the food Lelouch ordered for him.

"Why don't you just look for new opportunity in Fire Country then? Why head to Wave again?" Lelouch pressed.

"Well, I'm worried. You know the rumors about the Wave Daimyo going missing and Mist ninja right? And these pirates…they're not natural, I tell you. They were sailing a caravel, but have heavy cannons, with range far enough support a coastal siege! My liege was lord of a port castle so I know a little about these things. And I'm worried my family's in danger from Water's civil war spreading over. "

"That doesn't sound good…may the heavens have mercy on us all."

O O O

Mizuki and the Stupid Brothers made land in the morning. They had taken a tiny rowing boat and paddled their way over to Wave, occasionally running on the water with the boat lifted overhead when the brothers were sick of paddling or the waters got difficult.

As a result, there was nowhere for Anko and team to hide on the open seas while following them, and they were forced to find another way across and temporarily lost their targets.

The missing-nin trio quickly skulked over to what appeared to be a smuggler's den in a forest a little distance away from Wave's main town of Boro.

"Who are you, how did you find this place?" The were immediately surrounded upon revealing themselves. Various drugs could be faintly smelled, as the group of thugs pointed assorted weapons at the trio.

"Relax…we're with the Blue Snake. I have goodies for your boss," Mizuki responded as he took out a small jar.

O O O

It was late afternoon when the navigator yelled, "Ship on the horizon, four hours starboard from the bow!"

Not long after, the jolly roger was confirmed flying on the incoming ship, and it was charging right at them.

"All hands, prepare for engagement!" The captain shouted.

Then a shadow flashed in the distance and a large fountain burst a short distance in front of the _Hardy Anchor_. The ship was forced to turn and evade the wave of water that spread out from the center of the impact. The whole ship swayed with the rising water and non-combatants crammed into the inner cabins.

"What are you waiting for? Fire back damn it!" Rengo roared while whipping out his war axe.

"You moron, we don't have any cannons!" the quarter master yelled back.

The captain cursed. "We can't outrun them, charge them down!"

In between the five rounds of cannon fire, which fortunately all missed except one that hit the tail, Sasuke lost his stiff posture and looked a little pale as the ship rocked back and forth.

"Captain, they're skirmishing and rounding back to cut off our return path to Fire!" The quarter master warned after close observation. "They're faster than we are, we can't get close enough for boarding!"

Then the ship shook tremendously as a loud explosion could be heard, and there were screams from the cabin.

"Hit to port! Oh hell, there's another ship coming two hours portside from the tail!" the first mate reported.

"Damn! At this rate we'll be wrecked without a chance to fight!" The captain's knuckles turned white as he gripped the rail.

"Outgunned, outrun, outnumbered, we're so dead!" A random sailor broke into hysterics.

Lelouch rushed to the captain side. "Captain, if you want to win this battle, then do as I say!"

"Huh? Shut up, monk boy, this ain't time to be messing around!" The captain brushed him off.

However, Lelouch suddenly transformed before his eyes. Before he knew it, the captain felt a blade pressing against his neck, while the apprentice martial priest in front of him shifted into a blonde haired boy wearing a ninja vest and forehead protector with the symbol of a leaf.

Simultaneously, the rest of Team 7 had removed their disguises and surrounded the captain from behind, facing the rest of the crew.

"I'm afraid you don't have a choice, captain. This ship is now under the temporary control of Konoha. But don't worry, you'll get it back with interest soon enough," Lelouch stated.

Everyone else on the ship barely saw anything before the ninjas took the captain hostage and formed a defensive circle. But they didn't miss the second Naruto that appeared from nowhere behind the captain.

"N-ninjas!" somebody shouted. It was unclear whether the voice was scared or relieved. Everybody froze in a standoff.

O O O

—On one of the two pirate ships.

One of the pirates was looking at their latest victim through a telescope. Teams of gunners were preparing more cannonballs.

"Captain, their masts just went down! It looks like they're surrendering," reported the scouting pirate.

"Hold fire. Let's take a closer look." The captain tilted his pirate cap and waved his cutlass to the side in a blocking gesture. He had a sharp nose and angular chin that made him look fierce.

The ship moved in and circled around the unmoving _Hardy Anchor_ while staying beyond the range of typical arrows and bolts.

The other pirate ship pulled up to their allies.

"It looks suspicious! What do you think, ol' sharkhead?" The captain of the second ship, whose head had curly grey hair and a full-face beard, asked loudly to the other as they started moving in sync beside each other.

Both the crews had already observed the target ship. There were two damaged areas but nothing fatal. Water wasn't going in, and it could still keep going without any major issues.

On the deck there was just a single person with his back to the bow with a bunch of cargo crates on front of him.

That person was sitting down cross legged on a bench while playing a portable zither using thin white gloves. He was wearing a white robe with a large hood that drooped down to cover his face in shadow.

"Must be an ambush…do they think we're stupid? Luring us over with loot but actually hiding in the damn crates," came the response from the other cap-wearing captain.

"But who cares? They got one little ship, can't be carrying more than 20-30 fighting men at the most. We got over fifty men here between us," said the bearded one. "We can board from both sides and crush them." He was a greedy man, but he didn't want to take the brunt of the losses while the other one sat and watched when it wasn't clear what they'd be getting out of it.

Especially when the fighting force couldn't be small if they were willing to charge at them instead of running away immediately.

"Fine. But we need to be cautious," The first captain agreed. In the end, they were pirates and needed to thoroughly squeeze the juice from the fruit. They couldn't just waste cannonballs sending them to the bottom of the ocean without bothering to take anything. That's what the navy did…not astute businessmen like themselves.

Besides, there were some unruly subordinates they needed to be rid of anyway.

The bearded one grinned and eagerly took his ship to the other side and moved beside the _Hardy Anchor_.

Similarly, their allies locked on to their side and put down planks to cross.

Each captain took about half their men crossed carefully, observing for anything odd. They stopped on the port and starboard edges first, and the cap wearing captain shouted, "Hold up!"

The zither music shifted into heavy drawn out notes as if in warning.

An unlucky pirate was sent to slowly approach the one of the crates and open it up.

He touched the crate while sweating heavily.

He flipped over the top at once and prepared his wooden buckler shield in front of his face while glancing inside.

Then his nervous expression turned to glee and he started grabbing gold, jewelry, and other obvious valuables, stuffing them into his pockets as fast as possible.

The zither music suddenly switched to a rapid and cheerful tone.

The other pirates turned green with envy and immediately rushed over to grab a share of the booty before anyone else could take it.

"Wait! Stop!" The cap-wearing cautious captain shouted, but it was useless. Even the other bearded captain had charged like a beast to capture crates for his own ship. When it came time to split the loot, whoever captured more would obviously have more speaking power.

The 'Sharkhead' captain cursed. Why didn't these greedy fools stop to think how a random ship like this could be carrying several crates' worth of treasures? That kind of wealth wasn't common for entire noble families, and this small ship was just casually ferrying it across waters known to be infested with pirates?

In a few quick seconds, all the boarding pirates had surrounded the crates, leaving just the cautious captain by himself at the plank edge. Even the pirates staying back on their ships were whistling with avarice and started running the planks to get over and join the action. Even if loot was going to be split, weren't the ones grabbing it going to hide some for themselves privately?

Suddenly the music stopped.

White gas started pouring out of the crates.

The pirates who were grabbing loot were covered in the white fumes and had no chance to cover up their noses before they sniffed the knockout gas and dropped to the ground unconscious. This cheap knockout gas was neither safe for its victims or effective on those with significant chakra, but it served its purpose well.

Captain 'Sharkhead' saw the situation and prepared to retreat before he could be surrounded by enemy combatants that would no doubt appear from their hiding spots, but just as he flipped around towards the bridging planks, he saw them get enveloped in a cloud of purple smoke, making it impossible to see anything. Immediately after, arrows and crossbow bolts began shooting into the smoke, and pirates who were on the planks crossing started falling overboard in the confusion.

'Sharkhead' cursed again and took out a lengthy piece of rope with a metal hook at the end, before swinging it strongly against a pole on his own ship, slinging himself back, hitting the side of the ship before using some rapid parkour moves to get back on the deck.

Of the pirate's total force of over fifty men, nearly half had been knocked out at the crates, and a quarter fell overboard at the planks. Due to 'Sharkhead's men being a bit more cautious in general and because he sneakily sent less men over to begin with, their ship managed to retain a fighting force of twelve.

The more aggressive captain's ship was far less fortunate, with only two smart men staying back and the rest all gone overboard at the plank or managed to land on the _Hardy Anchor_.

As the music stopped, the guards and Rengo's team understood the signal and surged out from the cabin entrances.

"UWAAAH!" Rengo screamed mightily as he charged toward the few remaining men near the planks on the starboard side.

The pirates had panicked once their comrades were taken down, and had been easily crushed by the charging men.

"Retreat! Cover with explosive tags!" Captain 'Sharkhead' roared. This man had a bit of intelligence to him and decisively gave up the attack after realizing that they had gone from outnumbering the enemy 2 to 1, to possibly being outnumbered 2 to 1.

Unfortunately, his decision was within the set of possible responses Lelouch had predicted.

Lelouch had been closely observing this opponent the whole time and immediately moved after the gases were released. With chakra enhanced jumps, he had already made his way over to the enemy ship.

Meanwhile, the rest of Team 7 also emerged from the shadows of the mast poles and flung kunai at the pirates, knocking their explosive tag carrying kunai out of their hands before they had a chance to throw them! Unfortunately for the pirates, some explosive tags had already been lit and they were blasted by their own tags.

'Sharkhead' found the robed person who had been playing the zither a only short distance away from him, and was only surprised for an instant before he snarled and yelled, "Enough of your tricks, prepare to die, dishonorable wretch!" even as he charged.

Lelouch smirked and rushed forward to take him down but his eyes widened when the "enraged" captain, instead of charging Lelouch as his words seemed to suggest, sliced a rope hanging a mast up before charging into the inner area of the ship. Lelouch chased after but the huge mast fell down blocking his way and he heard the sound of something sizzling.

'Slippery trickster!' Lelouch thought in annoyance before he quickly jumped away and an explosion blasted apart the hidden entrance to the inner cabins.

Lelouch wasted no time before he made a bunch of shadow clones that swept into the areas below deck. However, soon afterward a series of explosions completely blew apart the middle of the ship and both sides tilted down, capsizing.

Although Lelouch didn't give up and continued searching for a bit, it was futile as 'Sharkhead' was nowhere to be found.

He regrouped with Kakashi and asked, "Sensei, do you have a way to detect somebody underwater?"

"Hm…I'm afraid not. If there aren't any air bubbles he must have some way to breath underwater. How curious," Kakashi answered as he looked over the wreckage from the deck of the _Hardy Anchor_.

"Sensei, Naruto, all the pirates have been rounded up," Sakura walked over and reported.

O O O

After swiping everything off the pirates and looting their ship, each member of Team 7 took about 200,000 Ryo worth of loot for themselves, while the remaining loot worth about 750,000 Ryo was split between the other combat participants whose contributions were fairly insignificant. The ship itself was kept by Team 7 as well, and Lelouch estimated it was probably worth at least R5,000,000 with all of the cannon and advanced components. Of course, Lelouch had secretly salvaged an extra R450,000 worth of loot himself from his clones that swept through the sinking ship before it fully went under.

From this it could be seen that the pirates had quite a profitable job. With about 30 pirates to a ship, assuming all their shipboard wealth was accumulated over the past three months or so of activity, that meant each pirate had made an average of about 50,000 Ryo, which was twice that of an average commoner's income for an entire year.

Sakura gripped the storage scrolls in her hands like they were made of gold. She wasn't normally a money-hungry person but this sudden windfall was just too much! 200,000 Ryo was more than a typical chuunin made in a year after completing one C-rank mission and a few D-ranks each month. Heck, their current mission only paid 150,000 split between the four of them, and this was a reward usually only seen for B-ranks. Her parents were genin and chuunin, so it was only natural for these scrolls to feel extremely heavy in her hands.

With this kind of earning potential from plundering, no wonder the world was so lawless!

Kakashi wasn't so moved because his S-rank shinobi father and his own mission record had given him plenty of wealth.

Sasuke didn't even give the loot a second look as this little bit could hardly be considered pocket change to him, who had the entire Uchiha clan's wealth that could buy a country if he wanted.

Lelouch was highly satisfied with the spoils, as he had use for funds and started with little. There weren't any foolish nobles willing to gamble underground in Konoha – that was just asking to be robbed by ninja tricks. And most businesses with good potential were tightly controlled by the village itself.

He was slightly regretful that the second ship was blown up, because he might have taken it if he had used a more aggressive attack strategy. That was easily feasible given that Team 7 was more than enough to take them on in open battle. However, Lelouch was very cautious and preferred to win with minimal expenditure and casualties. Kakashi also approved the plan as it was his style to analyze opponents first before charging in, and there was no guarantee that the enemy didn't also have ninja. As it turns out, even if that escapee wasn't a ninja, there was something off about him.

The two ships continued sailing for Wave.

The captured pirates had their weapons removed and were forced to man their old ship which was now commanded by Team 7. A couple of pirates died from the dangerous knockout gas, but Team 7 didn't lose sleep over it. In this world, there actually existed truly "safe" knockout gases, but those were very expensive to create, and it was better to let the enemy die than risk themselves or lose men from their own side in battle. Their corpses were simply tossed overboard.

Team 7 had tied up the bearded captain, whose nickname was 'Wildlung', and prepared to interrogate him.

"Heh. Any of my cute students want to have a try first?" Kakashi asked as his eye curved like the moon.

Sasuke stepped forward eagerly. "Let me do it." He glared at the captain who huffed.

Without warning, Sasuke punched his face. "Who told you to make a sound?"

The man spat and glared back.

Sasuke grabbed him by the cuff of his shirt and pulled out a kunai. "Answer my questions or die."

To Sasuke's surprise, the man immediately shouted, "I'll tell you everything you want if you let me go!"

"Who's in charge of this pirate fleet?" Sasuke asked.

"Each captain's operating on their own. Nobody's in charge o' me dammit!"

"Then why are you working together?"

"We were all hired for a job! Take a ship and disrupt trading around Wave, and can't fight the other ships in our group. "

"Hired? By whom?"

"Some rich bastard in Whirlpool country."

Sasuke looked back at his teammates, who appeared equally confused as he was. Prior to the interrogation, they had come up with two main suspects for the pirates' origin. The Gato corporation and some kind of power from Water Country.

"What do you mean? We need more details. Who exactly was it?" Sasuke continued asking.

"I don't know! He operates through agents and just gave me the job and the ship. Never saw 'im. Must be damn rich though, he's got ninja working for him and all these ships to hand out."

After a few more rounds of questioning, they had gotten everything the man seemed to know. 'Wolflung' had been a sellsword and pirate roaming around the eastern oceans. Several months ago, an underground trader in Wave he usually went to get rid of his goods told him there was a high paying client in Whirlpool looking for experienced sailors to do a very big job, and he didn't even need his own ship, just a good team of hired hands. Wolflung followed the trader's instructions and went to a brothel in Whirlpool, and after a few rounds of being referred around, he thought he saw a ninja before he got knocked out. Unfortunately, his memories of that ninja were very hazy and all he knew was that they had a slashed headband.

When he woke up he found himself in a room with a masked agent. This agent told him the details of the job and where to find a ship and supplies that would be loaned to him for the assignment. The job was simple. Roam around common Wave shipping routes and attack as many civilian ships as possible, taking their goods. 50% of their gains would have to be paid back to the client every month at a designated location. Wolflung could keep the rest and distribute freely among his crew. They had to hit a minimum quota in order to receive more cannon ammunition and ship maintenance. If they tried to take off with the ships, they would be tracked down and killed, but he didn't know exactly how, just that the client's ninjas had no trouble doing that to the first and only crew that tried.

Wolflung didn't know anything about 'Sharkhead' or his origins before this job. He had heard of a few of the other captains who were also previously mercenaries or pirates, but nothing unusual. There were at least 11 other ships operating, but he couldn't be sure there weren't any he had never seen.

Interestingly, the pirates had also been ordered not to attack Gato corporation ships.

Team 7 discussed their findings and next steps.

"Could it be Gato corporation trying to hide their tracks and operating from Whirlpool country?" Sakura speculated.

"Hn. Then why make the pirates single them out to avoid? Anyone can see they're the ones benefiting from this," said Sasuke.

"They must be drawing attention on purpose or another power is using them as a smokescreen," Lelouch suggested. In fact he already had some ideas on who hired the pirates and why. It was not hard to see after considering who would really benefit from the drastic drop in trade around Wave. Gains in market share Gato Corporation made would be offset by the drop in total trade volume. And if they did get a monopoly on shipping, there would also be no more competitor ships for the pirates to loot. How would they get paid to keep patrolling and keep competitors out then? So the pirates were not meant to stick around for long…

But regardless of his thoughts, it was still just conjecture and not actual evidence, so he did not share them.

Kakashi intercepted the discussion. "Well, it looks like there's a good chance we'll meet enemy ninja if we keep going. Although we don't know the full truth yet, we can turn around now…"

He dropped a sweat as the three genin gave him a pointed look.

O O O

In a secluded area with dense foliage and tree cover, the glasses-wearing medic dropped down to the ground. He shifted a few large rocks and suddenly the ground opened to reveal a passage of stairs leading down.

Following the path, he reached passed a metallic gate leading to a horizontal hallway.

A person stepped out partly from the shadows of the gate, revealing a long and sharp spear made of an ivory white material extended from the grip of a pale white hand.

"Lord Orochimaru sensed a cursed seal activating. Did you have something to do with it, Kabuto?" The person in the shadows demanded with an accusatory tone.

"And if I did? Is it any of your concern?" Kabuto said as he turned his head around.

The sharp spear was pointed at Kabuto's face in an instant.

"The seals of heaven and earth are not only Juugo's flesh and blood, but also a tool for Lord Orochimaru's dream…I will kill you if you dare to spread it frivolously."

Kabuto's glasses glinted in the darkness as he smiled.

"Don't worry, I've put your friend's blood to good use. I'm sure Lord Orochimaru will approve."

"You overstep your bounds!"

The spear inched forward.

"Whether I did or not is up to our master to decide, not you," Kabuto responded calmly, his right hand already gripping on the spear in front of him.

"And you should remember who's in charge of curing your disease…Kimimaro."

The spear crumbled away like sand from the spot where Kabuto touched it.

O O O

A/N: This is the final chapter in the _Toss a brick to get a jade gem_ segment. When I first planned the story I didn't expect any one stratagem to take up 3 chapters. But in reality the best moves often reveal their effect long after conception, so it is hard to have one stratagem per chapter. I will briefly discuss the use of this stratagem as promised.

1\. In Lelouch's plan to make peace with Konoha's higher ups, it had been conceptualized as give and take from the onset. What he wanted was to stay secure and free to pursue his own agenda, but he recognized that he could not hide everything. So he showed his capabilities and admitted to being not the original Naruto (tossing the brick), in exchange for a chance at a working relationship (receiving the gem). It was a bit of a gamble, but if Konoha discovered it while he hid it, he would likely be in much bigger trouble and distrusted, just like the way the Black Knights betrayed Zero after suddenly finding out about Geass even if he never used it against them.

2\. During Lelouch's speech about Zero to Kakashi, he was vague and avoided lying directly as much as possible. He provided just enough information for Kakashi and company (tossing the brick) to come up with some potential answers and complete the story (receiving the gem).

3\. The "prison break" of Mizuki was a deliberate ploy by Konoha, who tossed the brick of Mizuki's freedom hoping that it would lead them to the gem Orochimaru. Unfortunately they were not aware of Kabuto, who realized the prison break was a sham based on the minimal collateral damage (ie, the "confusion" that should have provided an opportunity for Mizuki) and no other escapees.

4\. Kabuto thus countered with his own version of the stratagem, giving up a modified Cursed Seal formula to gain control over Mizuki and cause the Konoha trackers to follow him to an as of yet unknown purpose to achieve in Wave (and obviously not to Orochimaru).

5\. Lelouch bought Tenmaru some food to get him to spill his story, a simple use of the stratagem that most people have probably used at some point in their lives (but perhaps with drinks instead).

6\. When the pirates attacked from range, even ninja would be troubled if they didn't know how to water walk. There was no way to counterattack without their own cannon, so Lelouch devised a way to trick the pirates into coming closer. The lure of surrendered treasure was the bait, and Lelouch expanded on this by creating a situation where the pirates' caution worked against them. The overtly eerie situation with music made the pirates check the obvious "trap" cargo boxes, which led them to unexpectedly find what appears to be treasure, thus leading them to actually get trapped. Sharkhead was rather astute in seeing the problem, but the rest were swept up by the greedy actions of the first pirate who was sent to check the boxes and started stuffing the treasure into his own pockets.

Thank you to everyone who reviewed and favorited or followed the story. I will now answer a question which has appeared in reviews more than once:

Q: Does Lelouch still have his geass?

A: From Lelouch's perspective in-story at this point, he does not appear to have it. Geass and the link to the old world are a significant part of the story development so I cannot comment further without spoilers.


End file.
